The Communication Initiative
Development action with informed and engaged societies
The Communication Initiative
After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future.
 
Co-founder Victoria Martin is pleased to see this work continue under Wits' leadership. Victoria knows that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction.
 
We honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades. Meanwhile, La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA) continues independently at cila.comminitcila.com and is linked with The CI Global site.
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Vojo Brazil: Amplifying Quilombola Voices through Mobile Phones

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In October 2013, a training in Salvador, Brazil, introducing a multimedia technology called Vojo, was presented to 20 youth in a quilombo community (a settlement of people originally of African origin), Ilha de Maré, which has no internet access. The training introduced a means of posting content in the internet with inexpensive mobile phones that have no internet connectivity. The workshop was organised by the Mídia Étnica Institute, in a partnership with the MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Center for Civic Media. 

Communication Strategies

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."

Development Issues

Youth, Rights

Key Points

"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.

Partners

The Mídia Étnica Institute, MIT Center for Civic Media

Sources

MIT Center for Civic Media website, submission by Alexandre Goncalves on October 29 2013, accessed January 26 2015.