Esther Mwema on digital colonialism and who owns our undersea cables
Intro
Welcome to the Femininja Podcast. This series was co-Curated and co-hosted with our friends at Whose Knowledge?. These episodes were recorded during the Decolonizing the Internet, East Africa gathering, in Lusaka, Zambia.
Youlendree Appasamy
Welcome everybody to today's podcast. I am Youlendree Appasamy, the Communication Associate for the #VisibleWikiWoman campaign at Whose Knowledge?. And today with us we have the wonderful
Esther Mwema
Esther Mwema, also known as Hadassah Louis, and I am an artist and I am the founder of Digital Grassroots and also Safety First for Girls, respectively. This year I am the 2022 Mozilla Media Creative Media Awards Awardee.
Youlendree Appasamy
And we also have…
Kerubo Onsoti
Sylvia Kerubo from the African Women's Development and Communications Network, also known as FEMNET. And I work there as a digital media officer.
Youlendree Appasamy
And on today's podcast, we're going to be talking about decolonizing the internet, undersea cables around Africa, as well as digital colonialism.
Kerubo Onsoti
Welcome! Welcome to today's episode.
Esther Mwema
Thank you for having me.
Kerubo Onsoti
Yeah, so maybe we'll just start with your name, your country, your organization. Just tell us a bit more about yourself and, you know, the larger work that you do.
Esther Mwema
Thank you for asking that. I think when it comes to defining ourselves, it's very easy to go with categories or jobs. So, I would take that model, but I identify as an artist or if artistry was a gender. But what I do is I try to combine my work in digital inequalities and put on artistry aspects to it because I believe that art allows us to interrogate complex issues. I'm also a founder of the organization Digital Grassroots, and we work with young people to increase digital citizenship in local communities across the globe. Besides that, this year I was one of the 2022 Mozilla Creative Media Awardees. My project AfroGrids was selected to be one of the projects where I am using my research in big tech and translating that into artwork that interrogates the relationship between big tech and digital colonialism. Besides that, I have a long history of 10 years of being an activist for girls' safety, and it's something that I see to be my vocation. So that kind of explains the breadth of my work.
Kerubo Onsoti
So when you say art, what kind of art are we talking about? We have music, we have paintings, we have poetry. What's your specialization?
Esther Mwema
Yeah, I would say art is a way of life more than anything. Many times there is a separation in categories and say, I cannot be an artist because I don’t know how to paint or draw, but I think it's really about the way of life, trying to live life differently. So my art shows up in different ways. I do literary fiction, I write fantasy. I also do abstract art and contemporary poetry. So really whatever medium I can use, but usually the written word is where I'm most comfortable.
Kerubo Onsoti
So Esther, we are back at it. Now that you have told us your work, just take us through the journey of digital colonialism and how it intersects with the work that you do with the young girls.
Esther Mwema
Yeah, so my work really in each sector that I work with in each different part. Like, with safety for girls, that's a whole different ball game. With Digital Grassroots it's about making sure that the future of internet governance is as diverse as its users. And what I've also been doing in my work specifically with the Mozilla Creative Media Awards is interrogating big tech, like Facebook and Google, and their relationship with the African continent. So what we know is that Google has Equiano under sea cables and Facebook has got 2Africa, formerly known as Simba, believe it or not. And visually what that looks like is the African continent that is surrounded by undersea cables owned by these big tech companies. And which… What's even more amazing about it is that it is actually the audacity of Google taking the name of the Nigerian abolitionist Equiano and using that to name their under sea cables Equiano.
And for me it's how these corporations can co-opt and also appropriate colonial knowledge and try… and present themselves as liberators because the African continent has got a large population of young people and also there is a big infrastructure gap, and we are all trying to solve the digital divide. And so we have these big tech corporations presenting themselves as benevolent that we're coming to bridge that divide. But ultimately there is a cost. So the essence of it is recognizing how big tech has power to change the way we live. And if we don't recognize what… the impact that these undersea cables will have in our digital future, then we're ultimately giving away our right to determine what our futures look like.
Kerubo Onsoti
And would you say they have the power to change, you know, how we leave and how systems work, but they choose not to?
Esther Mwema (07:08):
I think it's about looking at it from the perspective that these are for-profit companies. And so the internet ultimately is becoming a public good, or it should be because we use it for our schooling, we use it for health, we use it for community building. We also use it for activism. And so it's about identifying what are the gaps that exist that allow such a large scale project, like Equiano and 2Africa, to take place without any community awareness that this is happening. For example, Equiano has already landed in South Africa, in Namibia and 2Africa from Facebook is coming in 2023. So these are very expensive projects that are taking place, but where is the community involvement of… people from the continent or “users”? So it's about changing the narrative that the continent needs to be saved, but recognizing the imbalance that exists where big tech corporations from another continent can have so much power over the infrastructure that we are using.
Kerubo Onsoti
Okay. So what would you say decolonizing the internet means to you?
Esther Mwema
Decolonizing really, as I mentioned earlier about being an artist, is about changing the way we live and recognizing that we do have a choice and we do have power. It's about seeing where does that hidden power exists and who is giving it away. It's easy to put blame on the corporations, obviously they're aggressive and they want to maximize their profit, but it's also recognizing how are we encouraging that system with our way of thought, with our imagination. So I would say decolonization starts with an imagination. Can we imagine a world, for example, where a country in Africa builds under sea cables across the American continent?
And just thinking of that visually makes us think, why can't I imagine that as a possibility? What kind of world do we live in? And with an imagination, that's when we'll start to… to change how we think, what we believe is possible. Because ultimately Google and Facebook are also imagining the future. They're imagining what that future looks like and it's a future where they're powerful, where they have control and where our data goes through them. So what can we… how can we imagine that differently? And that's why my work in Digital Grassroots is very important because we are bringing digital literacy to leaders, young leaders in underrepresented communities so that we can amplify the voices of those on the ground and start it from a bottom up approach where the internet remains open, there's still space for innovation, and that the most silent voice can be heard in a democratic way if ever it can be possible to have a democratic internet.
Youlendree Appasamy
So this is more a comment than a question. So in around 2016, I went to an art exhibition by a really an amazing artist called Tabita Rezaire who is Afro-Guyanese. And they were trying to understand the undersea cable network through looking at the transport roots of the Transatlantic slave trade and how a lot of the undersea cable routes follow the same routes that the ships used to take. And I think that in context with the name Equiano gives that a more potent and just horrible connection to colonialism, to enslavement, to oppression that we've been facing for centuries in Africa.
Esther Mwema
That is like a… very horrifying visual, but that's the reality is… it shows that the world we live in is still colonial. And many many times we hear that digital colonialism isn't the right term or it's not the same as before, but ultimately when people's lives are on the line, when our future is on the line, when our culture and our way of life will be dictated by this infrastructure, which is very, very hard to get rid of once it's there, I think it's, it's very eye-opening and it means there's more that needs to be done.
Youlendree Appasamy
And under the guise of benevolence of all of these big tech companies lies the real kind of truth of the matter, which is blood, which is enslavement, which is oppression. And that's something that they may not have directly kind of benefited from if you look at the chronology. But historically, clearly there's overlaps and interplays that they are not invested in shifting or in doing something differently.
Esther Mwema
Yeah. And I think that it's an issue of power because let's look at the history of the internet when it started. It started as a defense project for the US. So it had a military connotation from the beginning, but also looking at the same time period, the 1960s, what was happening on the African continent? It was still under… it was still the colonial era. And so when it comes to what we're seeing today, many people will say, oh, well what are you doing about it? But looking at it from a historical perspective, it is very hard to see how… even though they say the internet is open and it's anyone can innovate from it, there wasn't the involvement of… people from the colonized world wasn't included in that process. And so that even shows the gap that is there today from the technical side, from the data center side, there's just a lot that is rooted in colonialism that we don't acknowledge.
Kerubo Onsoti
Can we go back to the work in the grassroots? I've only heard benevolence, other big words, but we'll go back to the work in the grassroots. So you've talked about working with young leaders, young women, and so my question was how do you ensure that they're safe? How do you ensure that this space is safe for them? Because like I mentioned, the internet is a very wide space and you never know how deep they might get into it, so how do you navigate around that?
Esther Mwema
Yeah. One thing that Digital Grassroots does is through our programs is we try to bridge the gap to make the young leaders we work with, young people below the age of 29, to understand the social, political and economic aspect of the internet. There are many programs that teach coding or tech, but for us, we really want to make the young people and the young leaders we're working with to understand that the internet has impact not only online, but also offline. We… We have different sets of programs, and I'll just go through them briefly. One of them is the ambassadors program, which welcomes newcomers who are new in the internet governance space, young people who want to know how to be more engaged in the internet. We introduce them to internet for security, internet for social life, and internet for the economy because it's very foundational, it's very simple, nothing complicated.
So that whoever takes this course has an understanding that I as a user can become a digital citizen, an active digital citizen, and not just a passive user. And then we have a more advanced course for community leaders. It's called the Community Leaders Program. We have done different versions of them where we collaborate with partners. We have community leaders for internet advocacy, which we… we collaborated with the Open Internet for Democracy Institute to do. We also have had the community leaders for internet health, which we collaborated with the Mozilla Internet Health team. And right now we're also doing the digital rights learning exchange also with the Open Internet for Democracy Institute. And a core part of this course is about understanding firstly, how it works from the technical side, very basic, but also how to stay safe online and how to protect ourselves online as well as the principles for an open internet. So it's a very holistic approach and we prioritize gender equity in our programs, making sure that it's a safe space because that's where it all begins to give people a safe space to explore these questions where they otherwise wouldn't have had that space.
Kerubo Onsoti
Yeah, okay. And because today has been such a long day, a very long day, it's been hours of creativity, it's been hours of sharing challenges that we are facing in the different parts of the continent, what would you say is your biggest lesson for the day?
Esther Mwema
Yeah, I think that the biggest learning from today is that work is being done. And we may not always see it, but there are people who are putting their mind and their body on the line and working to create solutions. And just to see that solidarity in one room was very enriching. And also give strength to continue on this journey because honestly, dismantling systems is lifelong work and it's easy to get discouraged, but just being in the room with other people who are doing the same work and other people saying, I see you, you're not alone. I think that has been a really, really comforting thing from this convening.
Kerubo Onsoti
Do you think you have a favorite session?
Esther Mwema
The session that I really enjoyed was the one where we were asking ourselves a question about who we are. And I think we underestimate that so much because the main thing about colonialism is that it tells us who we are. It says that you are an African woman, this is where your limit is, this is where you can begin, this is where you end. And when we see things like violence online against women, when we see an internet created by men, it's literally telling us who we are. And I'm just coming to that realization right now that all our lives, especially as women, as coming from societies that are not acknowledged as having knowledge, we are being told that. And so that session which asked who we are and what we want to bring into the world, I think that was very, very beautiful. And I will reflect more on that because it was very hard to answer. And I was wondering, how have I gone my whole life? And in this moment where someone is asking me who I am and I'm not able to come up with an answer easily, and I'm just realizing that perhaps it's because we've been told our lives, this is who you are, this is who you're not.
Kerubo Onsoti
You never take a step back and think about yourself, society, and how we are brought up, especially as African women.
Esther Mwema
And especially in the work that we're doing to dismantle systems. We're so engrossed in the work. Initially, We're fighting for something, we're fighting for our own identity, we're fighting for our lives, we're fighting for our dignity, we're fighting for who we are. But if we forget that along the way, then something will be lost. For sure.
Kerubo Onsoti
Do you feel like… it's the fight... You know… I remember one time I was speaking to a colleague of mine. We find ourselves in situations where we fight even when we don't need to, because that's how we've been conditioned to do. It's like we are facing a system every step, you know. If it's school, if it's, you know, primary school, high school, there's only something that we are fighting up until now when we are now brought into the real world. Now you have to deal with… not the patriarchy… you know, and dismantling that is just, we are constantly fighting. Do you think that's also a part of it?
Esther Mwema
And a part of that is being labeled. We become labeled angry. We become labeled feminist. It's now a label. But it's the recognition that someone is fighting for their life, someone is fighting for the freedom to breathe, is not seen. There's just a label that's put there. And in that fight, we can forget who we are. We can forget what we're trying to achieve, and we can become part of that system where we become the fighters and we never get time to rest. I think someone in one of the sessions was talking about how work is about rest and toxic workplaces. And I would add that we are also living in a toxic world, which has put us in a corner saying, you be the activist, you fight for your life while we continue to do our work. And I think we need to use our imagination to see that even as we are fighting for what we believe in, for our identity, for our future, and for the future of others, to be free and open and “democratic” in quotes, that we recognize that we are living, we're alive in this moment, and that we deserve to have peace, we deserve to have rest, and we also deserve to have pleasure.
Kerubo Onsoti
That is very true. I agree. For our listeners who are not part of the in-person sessions at Decolonizing the Internet, what are your reflections? What would you like to tell them?
Esther Mwema
That's a tough one because it’s… I guess firstly, I would have to acknowledge that we have been living in the Covid era, and that has changed a lot of things, including how we use the internet and how we relate to it. And so I would say that if you haven't been part of this community, you haven't been able to make it here, that the work that's being done does not stop here. It is work that was brought together here, and that means that people can still get involved. And also recognizing our own personal understanding in the way we live our lives and seeing how the colonial era, which we might still be in, I think we're still in it, is –
Kerubo Onsoti
Is that why you're doing quotes?
Esther Mwema
The colonial era? Yeah, because I guess we celebrate, we've been celebrating independence, at least in Zambia for over 60 years. So I think not many people understand colonialism and how it's really very systemic and it's embedded in how we show up in the world. And I would say that this is an opportunity for people if you're not active in it, at least to be an ally, if being an ally is too much, at least being informed and reading about it or simply recognizing how we live our lives and how it has been dictated by people who are imagining what our lives should be like. And so I guess a parting thought for the listeners is asking, who are you? Answering that question. Who are you? And who told you that?
Kerubo Onsoti
Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Esther. Thank you for the reflections, and thank you so much for honoring our invitation. Hopefully we'll be able to have more conversations like this moving forward because this is going to be an ongoing conversation. It doesn't end here. It doesn't end tomorrow. We'll still continue talking about it until we find solutions. If we can find solutions.
Esther Mwema
We can. We can. We can. We can. Because we are, as someone says, we are… I am quoting people that I don’t know. We are our ancestors' dreams. Okay. Okay. Thank you. I have to attribute that. Thank you for having me.
Kerubo Onsoti
Thank you so much. Hope you enjoy the rest of the sessions.
Esther Mwema
Thank you.
Kerubo Onsoti
Okay,
Everyone
Bye
Outro
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much for joining us for the FemiNinja Podcast. We really believe and trust that you have enjoyed our conversations and they have pricked some thinking, some kind of wanting to find out more about feminism, about patriarchy, and what is the role for each one of us in detonating patriarchy and proudly and boldly claiming ourselves is feminist. So stay tuned, keep following us and engage with us on FEMNET website, www.femnet.org. Thank you. You can follow whose knowledge on Twitter @whoseknowledge.