Font: Euronews, Culturelearning world
Closing divisions
Closing the digital divide has become a major challenge in today’s internet world, especially as modern technology breaks down barriers of age and distance.
Rainforest Online, Brazil
In the remote parts of Brazil, life has not changed for centuries, except for one thing — a new class in computer skills.
Kaluanà Tupinambá, who is learning how to use a computer, said: “All these buttons, all these words appear. I didn’t know where to start, where to finish, so it was a mess at the beginning. It still is! You can never learn everything, but I can turn it on, connect to the net, Google things, send a message. I can do that.”
The aim is to try and end isolation by using new technology, and it is working. The website Indios Online is used to communicate with the world and with other native tribes all across Brazil.
Thydewa Project director Sebastian Gerlic told euronews: “In Brazil, indiginous tribes are marginalised and ignored by the mainstream. They are invisible, forgotten, as if they belonged to a different social class. And technology allows them to show Brazil and the rest of the world who they are, how they live, and their daily reality.”
Potyra Te, who is also learning to use the internet, proudly proclaimed: “We’re showing the world who we are, we’re saying that we exist, that we use technology, that we’re learning and that we want to show the world that we can use technology as well as preserving our culture.”
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