[Air-L] Digital Natives with a Cause?

[Nishant Shah]

Dear All,
We, at the Centre for Internet and Society, are currently working on a
Scouting project on Digital Natives with a Cause, exploring the potentials
and possibilities of social transformation and political participation in
the realm of youth and technology. The project is interested in mapping the
scholarship, policy and legislation in this area to look at what are the
knowledge gaps and which spaces need more research and intervention. In the
process of documenting the different ways in which the youth relate to
digital technologies, we are also examining what constitutes a Digital
Native identity and what are the ways in which the youth is changing the
landscape of politics and social engagement.

As a part of this study, there is one section that we are grappling with on
youth and hatred. The general imagination of a digital native is that of a
secular, pro-left, 'enlightened' young person who is in the pursuit of those
much heralded Internet Ideals of free speech, justice, inclusion etc.
However, we have gotten hints from various studies, that a lot of
right-wing, fundamentalist, and violent groups around the world are also
using the same tools and technologies to create the 'other' digital native
identity which is not focussed upon in regular discourse.

I was wondering if anybody in this list could specifically point me towards
documented cases, anecdotes or scholarly work done on this particular
phenomenon of the youth being mobilised by religious/political/cultural
groups towards acts of violence (sometimes dubbed as terrorism), hatred,
upholding of fundamentalist ideologies, discrimination et al.

Any pointers would be well appreciated. If there is somebody who is working
in this area, could you please introduce me to them, because I would like to
include their work as a part of this scouting project and hopefully also
look at some long term collaborations in the future.

Thanks for your time
Nishant

-- 
Nishant Shah
Director (Research), Centre for Internet and Society,( www.cis-india.org )
Asia Awards Fellow in Shanghai, 2008-09
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