Afro-Latinx Digital Connections - Paperback

by Eduard Arriaga (Editor), Andrés Villar (Editor)

How Black Latinx communities are using digital technology to achieve visibility and social justice

This volume presents examples of how digital technologies are being used by people of African descent in South America and the Caribbean, a topic that has been overlooked within the field of digital humanities. These case studies show that in the last few decades, Black Latinx communities have been making themselves visible and asserting long-standing claims and rights through digital tools and platforms, which have been essential for enacting discussions and creating new connections between diverse groups.

Afro-Latinx Digital Connections includes both research articles and interviews with practitioners who are working to create opportunities for marginalized communities. Projects discussed in this volume range from an Afrodescendant digital archive in Argentina, blog networks in Cuba, an NGO dedicated to democratizing technology in Brazilian favelas, and the recruitment of digital media to fight racism in Peru. Contributors demonstrate that these tools need not be state of the art to be effective and that they are often most useful when employed to sustain a resilience that is deep and historically grounded.

Digital connections are shown here as a means to achieve social justice and to create complex self-representations that challenge racist images of Afrodescendant peoples and monolithic conceptions of humanity. This volume expands the scope of digital humanities and challenges views of the field as a predominantly white discipline.

Author Biography

Eduard Arriaga, associate professor of Spanish and comparative literature at Clark University, is the author of Teoría Literaria and coauthor of Las redes del gusto: La novela en Colombia 1990-2005. Andrés Villar is a writer, artist, and independent scholar based in Ontario, Canada.

Contributors: Sandra AbdAllah-Álvarez Adebayo Adegbembo Maya Anderson-González Eduard Arriaga Silvana Bahia Yvonne Captain Monica Carrillo Yancy Castillo Alí Majul Maria Cecilia Martino Andrés Villar