Digital Connectivity: The New Frontier in Community Building

read time | 1 minute 30 sec

who | Gogo Isolezwe (they/ them), Sangoma, gender anarchist, and pawerent queering life

When do you feel the most heard?

“Ko group chateng jo!” 

And heard! The ease into digital community building continues to grow with each Android/iOS generation. Do they still call them that?

In a world where history erases the anthropology of many Black and Brown people, people of colour, of abilities and disabilities, zooming into our smartphones grants voice to even those who choose to stay behind the shadows.  

Finding commonality in difference is community holding that we all deserve. After recently being locked in with young adults who hail from the coastal lands of South Africa’s landscape we see the emergence of technology as a community-building tool. Homies aged seven to thirteen gather in the cow-run, dusty streets of eRed, a location emulating the many semi-rural townships spatially scattered throughout the country.

The dusty red of the soil erupts in clouds of dance to gather in a dance and grounded stones rhasha-rhasha creating instrumentals only found by connecting with sowed roots in the soil. “One-two one-two”, adults eager to tip their dancers gathered in anti they begin their routine guided by the stars of TikTok. Two-steppin’, rest of the crowd cheering emulating Tik-Tok dances. Their joy reverberates through dusks hour as each group dances to their favourite tune. After sharing in the briskness of amapiano, thems and little girls scurry home, to closed doors.  

When the sun sets and safety becomes further precarious, I sit in wonder of how far we have travelled, and how far we got to go. We open our screens and I see artists, writers and wonders immortalising their experiences in a way that cannot be erased. Tablets record our histories from Moses to user @loganandfriends.community we continue to write ourselves through our iris lens of lives unfolding. 

Yet still, we cannot talk about the new generation's communication tool, the internet without speaking about the inaccessibility of these tools for holistic learning. Community is formed, yes, but how is it sustained in safety? This reality undermines the inclusive nature of ‘connection’ as gatekept by capitalism. As history has proven, technological revolutions fail to translate equitable access and opportunity for intersectionality marginalised groups. 

Questions to ponder

1. How has technology changed the ways we fight for justice?

2. What ‘lockdown’ innovation tools have you used for teaching or working?

3. How do we leverage the internet as a tool for learning, and advancement in schools?