Towards appropiate user interface design preserving rural african communication practices-listeners roles in face-to-face communication

Description

In order to design appropriate interfaces for Indigenous knowledge Management systems. The fact that in those communities, communication takes place primarily through oral transmission also has to be considered. Oral communication involves both narrators and listeners who engage in an interactive correspondence including verbal and non verbal communication during storytelling. Many researchers focus on Narrators but in this thesis, we will concentrate on listeners’ contributions during interpersonal communications in rural communities. Non verbal communication such as gestures are prevalent in traditional oral African communities and these can offer rich information that can be infused in interface designs for human computer interaction. The aim of this mini-thesis is to identify general socio-cultural norms, communication behaviour such as non-verbal communication structures (gestures) including general verbal utterances of the rural Otjiherero speaking people to provide a basis for subsequent use in the design of local Systems.