Vojo Brazil: Amplifying Quilombola Voices through Mobile Phones

According to the Vojo website: Vojo is designed for people to post stories from inexpensive mobile phones via voice calls, SMS (text messaging) , and MMS (multimedia messaging service). It also makes it possible to set up and customise a group where people can post content to the internet from their phones. The aim of introducing this technology in the Ilha de Maré community was to empower young "quilombolas" and help them identify and denounce the violence they witness in their communities. Vojo enables them to reach bloggers and media outlets outside Ilha de Maré.

The training included a video with previous similar activities, and trainers led discussion on the future of the Vojo Brazil project. This pilot project is directed to reach communities in remote rural areas, indigenous groups, landless workers, and other disenfranchised groups alienated from the information society.

According to Vojo creators and trainers, "Vojo enables everyone to create and update a blog even whether she/he does not have computer or internet access. The tool allows the user to post audio stories from mobile phones and even public telephones. It is also possible to post photos and video from cell phones. The idea is to help the youth to become tech-savvy and connect their communities to a social network that can increase the awareness to their social, cultural and political demands in the Brazilian media ecosystem."

A Facebook page was developed on the workshop, showing an example of a message from the community to the Brazilian government.  According to one of the project coordinators: "In addition to Vojo, they [the youth] had talks on sexually transmitted diseases, black identity, media democratization and basic journalism. They must be able to spread the technology to other communities in Salvador and Brazil."

Youth, Rights

"Vojo is a hosted version of the VozMob Drupal Distribution, which has been developed by the VozMob (Mobile Voices / Voces Moviles) project through an ongoing collaborative design process with day laborers, household workers, students, and a diverse team from the Institute of Popular Education of Southern California (IDEPSCA). The online version was built by the MIT Center for Civic Media."

The Mídia Étnica Institute conducts projects in the fields of communication and diversity, including actions related to community communication and citizen journalism.