Developing code : aspiration and exclusion in the making of 'Silicon Savannah'
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- On a 2013 tour across Africa, Google's Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt proclaimed that Kenya's capital city of Nairobi "has emerged as a serious tech hub and may become the African leader." Echoing this statement, local and international press outlets have dubbed Nairobi "Silicon Savannah." They celebrate its burgeoning technology sector for spurring democracy and development, and for precipitating Africa's political and economic "rise." Based on twenty-five months of ethnographic fieldwork in Nairobi, my research addresses both these grandiose claims and the disparate places in which they find empirical traction: the elite spaces of software's production and the impoverished informal settlements in which such software is implemented and used. By putting into conversation theoretical approaches from anthropology, science and technology studies, African studies, and urban geography, this dissertation examines how diverse political and ethical claims become enmeshed in and expressed through digital technologies, which in turn shape understandings and experiences of development, citizenship, and governance in Nairobi.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2015 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Poggiali, Lisa |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Anthropology. |
| Primary advisor | Yanagisako, Sylvia Junko, 1945- |
| Thesis advisor | Yanagisako, Sylvia Junko, 1945- |
| Thesis advisor | Ebron, Paulla A, 1953- |
| Thesis advisor | Ferguson, James |
| Thesis advisor | Smith, James |
| Advisor | Ebron, Paulla A, 1953- |
| Advisor | Ferguson, James |
| Advisor | Smith, James |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Lisa Poggiali. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Anthropology. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2015. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2015 by Lisa Poggiali
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