Since 2008 we have co-designed technologies in rural Namibia for the purpose of Indigenous Knowledge (IK) collection, representation and transfer across generations with rural ovaHerero community members in Eastern Namibia. We deconstruct the tensions that occur between Western imprinted technology and the digital representation of Indigenous Knowledge in theory and practice. Assumptions regarding methods considered appropriate, as well as concepts and techniques are revised.
Design decisions need to be determined and negotiated within local contexts and an indigenous epistemology…
Our aim is to co-design technologies for the purpose of indigenous knowledge collection, representation and transfer to be used by the rural knowledge bearers. We deconstruct the tensions that occur between western imprinted technology and the digital representation of Indigenous Knowledge in theory and practice.
We are following a number of reasearch leads simultaneously:
- We are further improving the current prototype for independent deployment.
- We are investigating rural communities’..
The HomeSteadCreator (HSC) is a prototype which has been developed iteratively with a Herero community in Namibia. The original goal was to enable community members to digitally recreate their physical context to later embed locally recorded IK video, audio or…
One of the initiative ideas to preserve indigenous knowledge of the rural communities in Namibia is to find affordable ways on how to develop ICT solutions. The rural communities do not have sufficient funds to afford to pay ICT experts to develop software applications.
Community Collaboration Framework for Co-Design of Technology and Services
Principal Supervisor : Prof. Margot Brereton, Queensland University of Technology
Associate Supervisor : Dr. Alessandro Soro, Queensland University of Technology
External supervisor : Prof. Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, Namibia University of Science and Technology
We have been co-designing technology with indigenous people for over 7 years, where, sessions were initiated by local and external researchers. Many researchers lack the skills and knowledge to be able to build, develop and maintain the relationship with indigenous communities. Equally the community has not developed strong mechanisms of expressing their own set of rules of appropriate interactions.
Jackson Kaujeua Street, Windhoek, Namibia
Phone: +264-61-207-9111 / Fax: +264-61-207-2444
E-mail: hwinschiers[at]nust[dot]com