Educating tribal children
Kaushik Chattopadhyay, Seemita Mohanty · 2021
A consensus in today’s digital age is that digital accessibility can reduce all kinds of inequalities that are now prevalent in the society. As a result, on the one side, ICT has changed the outlook of the world for those who have the capacity to avail its usefulness, but on the other it is depleting the opportunities for those who fail to make use of its potentiality, thus making them digitally poor. And it is the vast marginalised communities who suffer the most due to lack of access to communication and information networks and services. This chapter speaks about an information dissemination intervention strategy called Information, Awareness, Motivation and Action (IAMA) that was designed and implemented in two tribal villages to address the issue. In the absence of a large number of digitally capable individuals among the community members it was found that interpersonal communication helped to build relationships between the local teachers, literate youth volunteers and community members. The sense of “commonness and homogenisation” established trust on both sides that further helped to change the perception, attitude and beliefs of the community that they are not passive participants in the process of education for their children.