Technology Stewardship and the Capabilities Approach: Assessing a Leadership Training Program for Agricultural Communities of Practice in Sri Lanka and Trinidad

• Author(s) / Creator(s)

  • Gow, Gordon A.
  • Dissanayeke, Uvasara
  • Jayathilake, Chandana
  • Chowdhury, Ataharul
  • Ramjattan, Jeet
  • Ganpat, Wayne
  • Isuri Kumarasinghe
  • Kumudu Ariyawanshe
  • Sanduni Rathnayake

• This poster summarizes early results of a technology stewardship training program introduced with agricultural extension practitioners in Sri Lanka and the Caribbean. Technology stewardship is an approach adapted from the communities of practice literature that recognizes the importance, practically and ethically, of guiding change from within a community. Technology stewards are social intermediaries “with enough experience of the working of a community to understand its technology needs, and enough experience with or interest in technology to take leadership in addressing those needs” (Wenger, White & Smith, 2009, p. 25). In contrast to transfer and diffusion approaches, stewardship training aims to foster community-based leadership to improve the informational capabilities of a community of practice by facilitating sustainable social practices enhanced by appropriate technology use.

• Date created

  2020-06-01

• Subjects / Keywords

  • information and communication technologies
  • Sri Lanka
  • rural communication
  • media and communication studies
  • technology stewardship
  • participatory action research
  • Trinidad
  • agricultural extension
  • Capability Approach
  • ICT4D
  • communities of practice

• Type of Item

  Conference/Workshop Presentation

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/r3-24wb-zh39

• License

  Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International