Heightened attention to technological diffusion and informational inequalities is of\ud
particular societal concern, given the increasing mediation of everyday life whereby\ud
web-based initiatives abound and an increasing amount of information on critical\ud
human services including education and healthcare are online or only available online.\ud
As Cheong and Martin (2009) note, the digital divide is a significant, multi-layered access\ud
challenge for institutions of higher education worldwide as they embark on e or distance\ud
learning programs, including the incorporation of virtual course management systems.\ud
Kreps (2006) also notes that the digital divide is an important health communication\ud
problem as new technologies can help underserved populations retrieve relevant health\ud
information, yet exacerbate disparities by reducing access to those most at risk for poor\ud
health outcomes

Cheong, Pauline Hope

Martin, Judith

English

Name not available

F. Sudweeks, H. Hrachovec and C. Ess (eds). Proceedings Cultural Attitudes Towards Communication and Technology 2010, Murdoch University, Australia, 42-44. ONLINE OUTSIDERS WITHIN A critical cultural approach to digital inclusion  PAULINE HOPE CHEONG AND JUDITH MARTIN Hugh Downs School of Human Communication Arizona State University, USA Heightened attention to technological diffusion and informational inequalities is of particular societal concern, given the increasing mediation of everyday life whereby web-based initiatives abound and an increasing amount of information on critical human services including education and healthcare are online or only available online. As Cheong & Martin (2009) note, the digital divide is a significant, multi-layered access challenge for institutions of higher education worldwide as they embark on e or distance learning programs, including the incorporation of virtual course management systems. Kreps (2006) also notes that the digital divide is an important health communication problem as new technologies can help underserved populations retrieve relevant health information, yet exacerbate disparities by reducing access to those most at risk for poor health outcomes.   Multiple commentators have highlighted how the Internet is the “new normal”, particularly for citizens in the developed and industrialized world. Yet technological adoption and use despite its increased technical availability in highly wired contexts, is not without its challenges. In light of the “social and technological interdependencies of new media” which “forces us to collaborate with people and systems not rewarded or designed to do so with us”, developing, embedded and pervasive “tensions  among interdependence, collaboration and dysfunctional sociotechnical interactions” has been proposed as an important area for further research (Rice, 2009). But beyond initial adoption, there is relative lack of critical research that examines secondary digital divides, including the consequences of Internet use like how users perceive and incorporate online information as well as interact with socio-technical systems in their everyday information practices.  Furthermore, the notions of “patient empowerment”, and “lifelong learning” as popularly associated with Internet access requires critical reexamination, given the emerging emphasis placed on facilitating “client or consumer” decision-making. For example, the editor of the Journal of Health Communication observed that the “informed patient” may be an “oxymoron in an information restricted society” (Ratzan, 2007). Prevailing assumptions in the biomedical approach governing health policy (Whalen, 2003) is that greater availability of online health information will create better informed patients, who will in turn be able to better evaluate their condition and treatments. Similar assumptions persist in the education arena where  A CRITICAL CULTURAL APPROACH TO DIGITAL INCLUSION 43 access to e-learning tools assists wired students to achieve pedagogical goals (Lim, Kim, Chen & Ryder, 2008).  To contribute to a broadened understanding of understanding of secondary digital divides, this article develops a dialectical approach to conceptualize digital participatory inclusion. Drawing upon recent studies in mediated healthcare and education, this article provides a critical cultural framework to assess the tensions in technological appropriation as disparities in informational access, knowledge, and outcomes may be dynamically shrinking, widening, and deepening in different embedded life contexts. Post Internet adoption divides exist and intensify as they are enfolded in historical social stratification patterns (Van Dijk, 2005). From a critical perspective, this article argues that what appears to be the shrinking digital divide may oversimplify understandings of digital health and educational inclusion since conflicting and contradictory, online and offline needs and experiences engender a need for a dialectical, rather than a dichotomous conception of Internet use.   Theoretically, we draw from intercultural communication and critical studies including Black feminist epistemology and the theorization of the “outsider within” standpoint (Collins, 1986) to recognize the “interlocking nature of oppression” to present challenging insights into the negotiation and appropriation of e-health and e-learning. Specifically, we explicate four dialectics (Martin & Nakayama, 1999) that are operant in technological diffusion and use, namely the history-present, cultural-individual, differences-similarities, and privilege-disadvantage dialectics. For instance for health communication, we illustrate and highlight how African American women as minority ethnic females may experience both empowerment and enervation in their use of the internet to seek health information, and face proportionately greater challenges in navigating the internet for what they perceive to be helpful health information. In e-learning we discuss how online pedagogical practices both facilitate cultural similarities and highlight cultural differences.   As most research on the digital divide tends to utilize the functionalist approach to analyze between group differences, attention to online cultural dynamics and conceptualization of the contradictory pressures experienced by online users help highlight differences experienced within groups and individuals, without essentializing any individual’s online behavior to group membership. As such, the notion of “internet use” may be broadened to include the management of conflicting tensions, uneven gains, multiple opportunities and challenges that people face in their contemporary mediated experiences.   References Cheong, P. H. & Martin, J. N. (2009). Cultural implications of E-learning access (& divides): Teaching an Intercultural Communication course online. In B. A. Olaniran (Ed.). Cases on Successful E-Learning Practices in the Developed and Developing World: Methods for Global information Economy. IGI: Global. Collins, C.F. (2006). Introduction. In African American women’s health and social issues. (2nd Ed). (pp.1-11). Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group. Kreps, G.L. (2006). Communication and racial inequities in health care. American Behavioral Scientist, 49(6), 1-15 44 P. CHEONG AND J. MARTIN Lim, J., Kim, M., Chen, S. S. & Ryder, C. E. (2008). An empirical investigation of student achievement and satisfaction in different learning environments. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 35(2), 113-119. Martin, J. N. & Nakayama, T. K. (1999).  Thinking dialectically about culture and communication, Communication Theory, 9, 1-25. Ratzan, S.C. (2007). An informed patient - an oxymoron in an information restricted society. Journal of Health Communication, 12(8), 705-6. Rice, R. (2009) Sociological and Technological Interdependencies of New Media. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 14: 714–719 van Dijk, J.(2005).The Deepening Divide. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 

Online outsiders within\ud

Elektronisch archivierte Theorie - Sammelpunkt

F. Sudweeks, H. Hrachovec and C. Ess (eds). Proceedings Cultural Attitudes Towards 
Communication and Technology 2010, Murdoch University, Australia, 42-44. 
ONLINE OUTSIDERS WITHIN 
A critical cultural approach to digital inclusion  
PAULINE HOPE CHEONG AND JUDITH MARTIN 
Hugh Downs School of Human Communication 
Arizona State University, USA 
Heightened attention to technological diffusion and informational inequalities is of 
particular societal concern, given the increasing mediation of everyday life whereby 
web-based initiatives abound and an increasing amount of information on critical 
human services including education and healthcare are online or only available online. 
As Cheong & Martin (2009) note, the digital divide is a significant, multi-layered access 
challenge for institutions of higher education worldwide as they embark on e or distance 
learning programs, including the incorporation of virtual course management systems. 
Kreps (2006) also notes that the digital divide is an important health communication 
problem as new technologies can help underserved populations retrieve relevant health 
information, yet exacerbate disparities by reducing access to those most at risk for poor 
health outcomes.  
 Multiple commentators have highlighted how the Internet is the “new normal”, 
particularly for citizens in the developed and industrialized world. Yet technological 
adoption and use despite its increased technical availability in highly wired contexts, is 
not without its challenges. In light of the “social and technological interdependencies of 
new media” which “forces us to collaborate with people and systems not rewarded or 
designed to do so with us”, developing, embedded and pervasive “tensions  among 
interdependence, collaboration and dysfunctional sociotechnical interactions” has been 
proposed as an important area for further research (Rice, 2009). But beyond initial 
adoption, there is relative lack of critical research that examines secondary digital 
divides, including the consequences of Internet use like how users perceive and 
incorporate online information as well as interact with socio-technical systems in their 
everyday information practices.  Furthermore, the notions of “patient empowerment”, 
and “lifelong learning” as popularly associated with Internet access requires critical 
reexamination, given the emerging emphasis placed on facilitating “client or consumer” 
decision-making. For example, the editor of the Journal of Health Communication 
observed that the “informed patient” may be an “oxymoron in an information restricted 
society” (Ratzan, 2007). Prevailing assumptions in the biomedical approach governing 
health policy (Whalen, 2003) is that greater availability of online health information 
will create better informed patients, who will in turn be able to better evaluate their 
condition and treatments. Similar assumptions persist in the education arena where 
 A CRITICAL CULTURAL APPROACH TO DIGITAL INCLUSION 43 
access to e-learning tools assists wired students to achieve pedagogical goals (Lim, 
Kim, Chen & Ryder, 2008). 
 To contribute to a broadened understanding of understanding of secondary digital 
divides, this article develops a dialectical approach to conceptualize digital participatory 
inclusion. Drawing upon recent studies in mediated healthcare and education, this 
article provides a critical cultural framework to assess the tensions in technological 
appropriation as disparities in informational access, knowledge, and outcomes may be 
dynamically shrinking, widening, and deepening in different embedded life contexts. 
Post Internet adoption divides exist and intensify as they are enfolded in historical social 
stratification patterns (Van Dijk, 2005). From a critical perspective, this article argues 
that what appears to be the shrinking digital divide may oversimplify understandings of 
digital health and educational inclusion since conflicting and contradictory, online and 
offline needs and experiences engender a need for a dialectical, rather than a 
dichotomous conception of Internet use.  
 Theoretically, we draw from intercultural communication and critical studies 
including Black feminist epistemology and the theorization of the “outsider within” 
standpoint (Collins, 1986) to recognize the “interlocking nature of oppression” to 
present challenging insights into the negotiation and appropriation of e-health and e-
learning. Specifically, we explicate four dialectics (Martin & Nakayama, 1999) that are 
operant in technological diffusion and use, namely the history-present, cultural-
individual, differences-similarities, and privilege-disadvantage dialectics. For instance 
for health communication, we illustrate and highlight how African American women as 
minority ethnic females may experience both empowerment and enervation in their use 
of the internet to seek health information, and face proportionately greater challenges in 
navigating the internet for what they perceive to be helpful health information. In e-
learning we discuss how online pedagogical practices both facilitate cultural similarities 
and highlight cultural differences.  
 As most research on the digital divide tends to utilize the functionalist approach to 
analyze between group differences, attention to online cultural dynamics and 
conceptualization of the contradictory pressures experienced by online users help 
highlight differences experienced within groups and individuals, without essentializing 
any individual’s online behavior to group membership. As such, the notion of “internet 
use” may be broadened to include the management of conflicting tensions, uneven 
gains, multiple opportunities and challenges that people face in their contemporary 
mediated experiences.   
References 
Cheong, P. H. & Martin, J. N. (2009). Cultural implications of E-learning access (& divides): 
Teaching an Intercultural Communication course online. In B. A. Olaniran (Ed.). Cases on 
Successful E-Learning Practices in the Developed and Developing World: Methods for 
Global information Economy. IGI: Global. 
Collins, C.F. (2006). Introduction. In African American women’s health and social issues. (2nd 
Ed). (pp.1-11). Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group. 
Kreps, G.L. (2006). Communication and racial inequities in health care. American Behavioral 
Scientist, 49(6), 1-15 
44 P. CHEONG AND J. MARTIN 
Lim, J., Kim, M., Chen, S. S. & Ryder, C. E. (2008). An empirical investigation of student 
achievement and satisfaction in different learning environments. Journal of Instructional 
Psychology, 35(2), 113-119. 
Martin, J. N. & Nakayama, T. K. (1999).  Thinking dialectically about culture and 
communication, Communication Theory, 9, 1-25. 
Ratzan, S.C. (2007). An informed patient - an oxymoron in an information restricted society. 
Journal of Health Communication, 12(8), 705-6. 
Rice, R. (2009) Sociological and Technological Interdependencies of New Media. Journal of 
Computer-Mediated Communication 14: 714–719 
van Dijk, J.(2005).The Deepening Divide. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 


An informed patient - an oxymoron in an information restricted society.

Communication and racial inequities in health care.

Cultural implications of E-learning access (& divides): Teaching an Intercultural Communication course online.

Introduction. In African American women’s health and social issues.

Sociological and Technological Interdependencies of New Media.

Thinking dialectically about culture and communication,

Online outsiders within\ud

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Name not available

Elektronisch archivierte Theorie - Sammelpunkt