Aidnography

Dear all, This week's review is slightly belated again, but I spent an interesting day in Copenhagen yesterday and focused my energy 'offline'. As always, some new resources, a great discussion on Swedish colonialism, an important reminder why politics still, always matter in aid and me disagreeing about the power of personal stories in development. I also disagree with a very positive assessment of civil society peace making, with the 'giants of online education' and lastly with the Internal Studies Association's silly idea to ban journal editors from blogging. But other than that I'm actually in a happy weekend zone ;)! Enjoy! New on aidnography Tech4Rural, box thinking & reflections on innovative ideas meeting development challenges I participated in a very interesting and in many ways insightful event in Copenhagen yesterday, organized by colleagues from the Technical University of Denmark, DTU. This was a modest event aiming at bringing together te...

Thanks to Jacob ’s and Jonas ’ invitation I participated in a very interesting and in many ways insightful event in Copenhagen yesterday, organized by colleagues from the Technical University of Denmark, DTU . This was a modest event aiming at bringing together technological knowledge, entrepreneurial ideas and development expertise. As an Örecomm member and project member of the GoComm project where our combined development, communication and media expertise will meet the real world outside academia in the Öresund region, we will be involved in more of these event in the future. Together with my colleagues Lene and Jacob we will be talking more about the project in our forthcoming talk at the Social Media Week in Copenhagen. As an academic participant-observer I got some very interesting first insights into some of the broader challenges when innovation, technological ideas, business cases and ‘development’ meet.  Given the audience of primarily yo...

Dear all, As I am still working on a storified account of the Sida talk from earlier this week below is a slightly belated and shorter weekly link review-nonetheless, there is some great stuff, or, more precisely, some great people featured this week! Ian Thorpe features a nice group post by UNICEF colleagues on what 2014 might bring-and then there are celebrity efforts gone wrong (Elizabeth McGovern), Africa's first female coffee quality instructor, a radical artist's view on China's 'discovery' of Africa-and Norma who speaks out at a meeting and sums development challenges up better than any policy paper could ever do. A Balkan expert reflects on the political economy of urban change in Skopje, an ethnographer reflects on an EPIC conference, plus, a great piece of investigative journalism on Balkan academic corruption and degree mills. A bit different, eclectic--but hopefully stimulating food for though! Enjoy! Development Popular Representations of Developm...

Hi all, Happy New Year and welcome back to Aidnography ! I just returned from the official Popular Representations of Development book launch in London -and I will be in another European capital next week to talk more about new (social) media. Photo courtesy of Dennis Rodgers As always, there is also an eclectic mix of interesting reads that I have come across: There is the 'stuff to read' subsection about 'World 3.0', a history of celebrity engagement and a great reading list on peace & conflict; obesity, the 'hype cycle' and tribalism in South Sudan are three of the 'bigger issues' featured in the next section; 'in other news' 'the field', Jennifer Lentfer and Shawn Humphrey are back with new gigs; and then there is great essay on why the political right likes open developments, more on MOOCs and an old-school Foucault lecture from 1980 for your Ipod! Enjoy! New on aidnography SIDA/ComDev seminar 'Communication for d...

Aidnography is back from the holidays and wishes his readers a very happy and successful 2014! Together with my colleague Oscar Hemer I will be in Stockholm next week for a couple of meetings and seminars. Our colleagues (including some very energetic, proactive students from our ComDev MA program ) at Sida have invited us to discuss new (social) media, ICT, development and social change and we are really looking forward to the debate between academia, teaching and development policy and practice! In the words of the official seminar announcement: The emergence and global spread of new ICT's has changed the landscape in the area of Communication for Development and created new tools for actors for social change. This momentum presents new possibilities and challenges within the field. Malmö högskola and Sida invite you to an afternoon to discuss and exchange ideas. More information about the afternoon and how to attend if you are in or near Stockholm can be found on Sida's...