Abstract
Based on observations of a rural community and in-depth interviews with five rural women, this paper shows how access to smartphones enables marginalised rural women to engage in digital literacies in their everyday life practices. The research shows that rural women learn digital skills, communication skills, and literacies in an unplanned and informal way within the family setting and their neighbourhood and through commercial activities in the local markets. The paper concludes that policymakers have much to learn from the unplanned and informal ways in which these rural women are developing their digital literacies in their everyday life through having access to smartphones. Therefore, using smartphones with informal learning approaches could provide a foundation for future literacy programmes.
Despite low connectivity and lack of infrastructure, digital literacy and the motivation to become digitally literate have expanded in rural areas.”
Introduction
The increasing trend of converting information into digital formats is having transformational effects on various aspects of society such as business, education, management, and healthcare. At the same time, internet connectivity, popularity of smart phones and other mobile devices, are leading to increased digitisation (Reed, 2018) which in turn, is transforming education. E-learning platforms, digital textbooks, and online resources are providing access to education regardless of geographical location (Rakha, 2023). The positive impacts of digitisation (access to information, labour efficiency and productivity, economic opportunities, innovation and creativity) are somewhat mitigated by its negative impacts (digital divide, information insecurity, digital dependence, and disruption of traditional culture) (Turel et al., 2021).
A growing body of research on digitisation focuses on technology-enhanced digital literacy and the transformation of modern education in formal institutions (Farias-Gaytan et al., 2022). Digitisation is also affecting learning approaches and educational access in rural areas (Sahu & Samantaray, 2022). However, little research has focused on digital literacy through informal smartphone learning for women’s development in low income countries.
Within marginalised – mainly rural – populations, smart phones used in everyday life are changing learning patterns and communication (Potter & McDougall, 2017). In this context, digital tools have become a medium of communication and reflection, thereby setting up new social practices among the people and their context (Jones & Hafner, 2021). The tools facilitate purposeful events in the community where people learn in their everyday life through informal learning and sense-making. In contrast to the development of digital literacy practices in formal educational settings with direct support of teachers and curriculum, in rural communities, these practices develop through a trial-and-error approach (Taylor, 2006; White et al., 2012). This paper analyzes how rural women are developing their digital literacies through smart phones, Digital literacy is increasingly central to everyday activities and livelihoods. Digital literacy in informal everyday life contexts increases the capability of using digital tools for communication (Tour et al., 2021), playing a part not only in a social transformation but also in a linguistic one (Potter & McDougall, 2017). As a result, digital literacies are used as learning tools for generating meaning and valuing experiences in their context in formal schooling and everyday learning (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008).
Drawing on the notion of digital literacy as a social practice on the one hand and the notion of “dynamic literacy” (Street, 2003) on the other. Within this framework, literacy practices – including digital literacies, are not confined to formal educational settings but are enacted and transformed through mundane experiences, everyday work and learning needs. Dynamic literacy has also been used to highlight the social practices that have emerged within communities to fight against social exclusion, sometimes known as “hidden literacies” (Nabi et al., 2009). Applying an ethnographic case approach (Barton, 2012; Robinson-Pant, 2000; Rogers, 1999; Street, 2016), the paper explores how rural women seen as “illiterate” by policymakers in terms of formal education, engage in literacy and learning through smart phones. The use of smart phones for the development of literacy and numeracy competencies has been widely researched (Belalcázar, 2015; West & Ei, 2014). Digital literacy develops communication skills and self-confidence in dealing with social issues (Beetham et al., 2009)
Digital Literacies and Learning in Nepal: Functional Literacy, Formal Learning
In Nepal, digital literacies tend to be associated with urban areas and formal schooling, exacerbating the digital divide. Rural areas generally tend to have less access to technology and smart phones, and the internet, compared to urban areas. In this context, rural women face a range of socio-economic challenges that limit their access to formal schooling and, therefore, their ability to benefit from technology. In terms of literacy and learning, there has been an emphasis on formal education in Nepal, with out of school children and youth seen as a problem (Rappleye, 2019). Then from 1990 onwards, when literacy and learning through the state and non-state actors (Robinson-Pant, 2000) became the focus of development aid, literacy and learning programs outside of the school setting were funded for those adults who could not read and write (Gautam, 2011). Despite this, regard, “learning” in Nepal continues to be largely defined and understood in conjunction with “formal schooling”, whereas informal learning is largely ignored. Furthermore, Acharya and Devkota (2021) have argued that literacy practices in Nepal continue to be dominated by functional literacy and formal approaches while taking little account of informal, incidental and intergenerational literacy and learning. Literacy campaigns in Nepal continue to emphasise formal learning in literacy campaigns (Gautam, 2012), and this rationale is seeping into the recognised need to improve digital literacies in Nepal. At the same time, Nepal’s recent School Educational Sector Plan (2022–2030) aims to strengthen the alternative pathways of education by expanding the use of Information Communication and Technology, including the development of online and offline digital materials (Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, 2022). In other words, literacy is being connected with the contexts and spaces of people’s everyday lives beyond the confines of the classroom and formal pedagogies. A specific strategy to develop digital literacy is the use of smart phones.
Methodology: Ethnography in Literacies Research
The ethnographic tradition has been proposed as ideally suited to exploring literacy and learning in context (Barton, 2012), the ongoing “interactions and observations of the learning context” (Jerolmack & Khan, 2018). Personal interactions with participants capture the verbal experience of the participants, whereas observations encode the fieldwork beyond the verbal system (Bonanno, 2023). Both meaning-making processes activate vision, memory and perception of participants (Bonanno, 2023).
Over a period of seventeen months (from July 23, 2019, to December 31, 2022), we visited the research site six times, observing the everyday lives of women and interacting with them through informal conversations. The observations were important to understand the culture, practices and behaviours of using smart phones among rural women. Observing everyday life of rural women allowed us to gain a deeper understanding of contextual social and cultural norms, values, and beliefs that shape the digital practices of these rural women. The conversations enabled us to construct holistic accounts of how women were developing their digital literacies through the smartphone. This approach helped us to explore the informal ways of learning digital skills and, hence life skills, in a rural community.
Research Context and Participants
The research site is a rural village in Lumbini Province, Nepal, comprising 103 households. About 80% of them belong to the ethnic community of Tharu; others are Brahmin, Chhetris and Magars. Being a relatively small and homogeneous village, we could identify the pattern of women’s behaviour with the cultural interpretation of their everyday life. Speaking and understanding local languages, helped us as researchers we to develop intimacy, rapport, and trust. Women selected for in-depth interviews were below 40 years old and met two criteria: (a) they demonstrated their willingness to engage in reading and writing through using a smartphone and (b) they seemed relatively confident in using a smartphone in their everyday life. Informal conversations were complemented by in-depth interviews to probe further into what we observed and allowed us to explore their experiences of using smartphone. Interview questions focused on understanding their motivations for using smart phone, learning experiences, and uses of smart phones. This helped us to gain a richer and more detailed understanding of the ways in which those women used and benefitted from smart phones.
We used an iterative process to generate meaning by developing categories and themes (O'reilly, 2005). After fieldwork, we took notes from interactions and observations. Moreover, we used recorded events and phenomena to figure out the pattern of their voice and movements through the phrases and words to generate the main themes from the fieldwork as the process of making sense. We recorded interviews and transcribed the key messages following oral coding. We listened to these recordings repeatedly, aiming to get to the gestalt of the interviews, then connected them to the research questions, thereby generating themes (Brewer, 2000). We developed a thick ethnographic account (Geertz, 2008) to draw further meaning from the account. After we conducted fieldwork, we took notes from interactions and observations. Moreover, we used recorded events and phenomena to figure out the pattern of their voice and movements through the phrases and words to generate the main themes from the fieldwork as the process of making sense. This is an iterative process to generate meaning by developing categories and themes (O’reilly, 2005).
Ethics in Research
In adherence with research ethics, we obtained participants’ informed consent, ensured anonymity, and sought to build trust throughout the process. In addition, we followed sets of principles to guide our ethical practice of non-maleficence (no harm policy), maintaining autonomy or self-determination (respecting the values and decisions of research participants) and ensuring justice (treating all participants equally) to the participants (Bos, 2020), with approved ethical approval from Kathmandu University School of Education.
Key Findings
Digital Literacies, Informal Learning, and the Smart Phone
There has been a visible increase in access to and use of smart phones. Until July 2019, internet connectivity was very low, with only two houses in the community having internet access. By the end of December 2022, more than 50% of households had access to the internet. Whereas mobile data has been the dominant way to access the internet, optical fibre connections are being increasingly installed. During our long engagement in the community, we witnessed how the day to day engagement of these rural women was being facilitated by the use of smart phones. Through observations and interviews, we explored the skills they have learnt through using the smartphone, for oral communication and networking, and reading and writing texts. In the absence of formal and structured settings of learning for digital literacies, through their engagement with smart phones, rural women are developing their digital literacies through informal learning.
Learning to Use Smart Phones
Rural women learn to use digital tools in their families, neighbourhoods, and markets. They learn basic skills at home, then they, in the neighbourhood, and, more complex skills through being at the market.
First, the family was the first nod to learning digital tools. They learnt it by playing and chatting with family members. Rupa: I didn’t know how to receive a smart phone when getting it from the market. My husband bought it and gave it to me before he went for foreign land. In an evening he taught me two functions of the smart phone, just to receive and cut the call. I also learnt many from my children.
We, time and again, observed that rural women usually gathered at a common place of the community or at the home of a member of the community, generally in the evening when they finished their household work. They shared their experiences of the day, including the problems they faced while operating mobile apps.
While using a smart phone, they encountered several problems they could not solve at home, discussed each other. They asked the children and youths who were around there. They also got support from the community members. In the evening, sometimes they sat in their courtyard, which was joined with the neighbours. First, they shared such problems with their neighbours. The smart phone users liked to learn from the neighbours to solve such problems themselves.
These women met other women at the public tap or in the paddy field and forest, where they also shared the problem of using a smart phone. It was not only about the smart phone but also with other problems in their everyday life. Their collectiveness has been observed in many kinds of personal and social work taking place in the community.
Sometimes, when they could not solve the problems, they would inform the neighbour or seek somebody who was more “educated” in the village. They even went to the knowledgeable person’s house to get the problem of their Smart Phone solved. Rupa: All of a sudden, the phone was dead. I pressed every possible button to reopen it. I could not make it. I shared the problem with my neighbor, but she could not help me. Then, I went to the home of an educated person from the same community. He was not there when I reached there. I talked to his mother about many other things. When he arrived, he tested and put on the charger. After a few minutes, the phone blinked with power. I had also tried to charge but it did not show any sign when I put in the charger. He said that if the battery was exhausted, it took time to pick up the battery; then onwards I have never been careless to use the Smart Phone till the battery was exhausted.
Likewise, Maiya learnt how to recharge her smart phone from a neighbour: I had bought a one hundred rupees recharge card (voucher) to credit the phone. I scratched the card, then the number appeared, but I could not use these number to recharge the balance on my phone. Then, I went to the neighbour who helped me top up the vouchers and taught me also, but I was not habituated to crediting such vouchers on my smart phone.
Sudha and Chhoki said that they learnt about the radio and camera while they were playing with their smart phone. Mainly, they demonstrated the collective nature of learning on the smart phone.
Local shops were also important learning contexts for using digital tools and literacy. They usually visited shops to recharge their smart phone. They can recharge it at their village with a voucher. Recharge cards were available in the local shops in the villages. They would also put songs on their smart phone in the market. At that time, they also asked about any kinds of problems they faced while using the smart phone. These local shops did not provide technical support to them such as maintenance and repair. Then, they needed to go to the market. Mainly rural women went to the market for different purposes in their everyday life. The market is located nearly six km east of the village. Usually, they would go to the market to purchase goods for their family, sometimes they would go to the market to withdraw money from the bank when their husbands sent from foreign labour migration, and sometimes they would go there to sell local products such as vegetable and fruits from their farm. Maiya shared that her smart phone got switched off frequently and she shared the problem with the shop keeper, who mended the smart phone in the blink of time and asked for two hundred rupees, but she did not give. She said, “I negotiated with the shopkeeper.” Sudha also had a similar experience of negotiating with a shopkeeper. Once I was in the local shop, the shopkeeper debriefed me about the radio on the smart phone. He said that I did not need any external device, such as an air phone, to listen to the radio. Then after, I came home and tried to listen to the radio, but I could not make it. Later, I pressed the right and left keys on my smart phone. Suddenly, I heard songs on my smart phone. I could not come back. Again, I pressed some other bottoms and the radio got switched off.
Sudha’s experience illustrates how women can learn to use complex tools like smart phones without formal teaching. Their initiation was important to locate learning and literacy in an informal way. These learning contexts promoted the digital literacy of the women.
Stories of women were important to expanding their technological learning space at home, in the community and in shops. The passion of learning digital literacy boosted their confidence to interact with people outside of the home. Moreover, they learnt reading and writing via digital literacy which helped to strengthen their income-generation activities.
Smart Phones, Communication, and Social Status
Rural women in this study come to use smart phones primarily to keep in touch with their relatives and family members working abroad and/or in other locations in-country entertainment purposes. At a more abstract level, they see it as a symbol of luxury, showing how their economic status has improved as compared to the past: Maiya said, “Our past was difficult. We had little money and were a large peasant family, so we worked hard. Male family members worked in the paddy field, and female members helped them after completing household chores. We could not afford phones. However, with a reduction in agricultural activities, male family members have migrated to the Middle East for work. It has become necessary to have a cell phone to keep in touch. It would be a humiliation if we did not have a phone.”
While rural women had low confidence, initially believing that they could not use the smart phone, they rapidly learnt to use the smartphone through informal means. They were able to adapt the technology in their everyday life. The smartphone has become necessary in order to stay connected with family members working away from home but it is clear that the smartphone has come to represent their changing social and economic status. In other words, as well as being convenient tools to communicate and disseminate information, smart phones have symbolic value.
The use of cell phones also made their life easier because they can relate to other local people, family members and relatives by exchanging information in private and public spheres of life. Rupa: I never imagined using a smart phone in my life because I was limited to doing household chores. Having a smartphone makes it easier to give and get information about other activities: local meetings of forest user groups, local canal maintenance, and selling goods on the market.
During those days (2019), they could not have an internet connection in the village. They used mobile data for messengers and other communication devices. It was a little expensive. Even the tariff on local calls was high during that time. However, in later years, they have access to the internet, which have made it easier to communicate with the wider people. When they have leisure time, they use cell phones to learn something. As a result, they got much time of using social media such as Facebook and TikTok. Sudha: I could not figure the time span that I spent in TikTok and Facebook… I forgot everything while I was in TikTok. Sometimes, I got very useful information from TikTok and sometimes it was boring and useless.
They engage in smart phone which they said have both interesting and uninteresting things. However, they get news and information about the local and national context. They understand that smart phones have made it easier to get informed of useful ideas and skills of doing things unless otherwise it was difficult for them to get and read the newspaper in rural areas. Though the use of smart phones in rural areas emerged from the communication and status quo in the community but they learnt technological and social skills to use them.
Digital Literacy Skills
As discussed above, Tharu women have informally learnt to operate a variety of digital tools through their smart phones. Smart Phones in different contexts such as in the family, community, and market enhance their digital literacy skills. They learnt to operate smart phone specially for making calls, taking photos, sending messages, and so on which were basics of communication. In this line, Rupa said, “It was really difficult to use phone and always scared of using it because I did not know the basic operating system and skills but gradually, I learnt its operation”. They could have access to information. They created a Facebook account, and messenger became handy to communicate with family and relatives in other places. Maiya: I looked at Facebook and Messenger for a few minutes…. If I have received messages, I would reply to them; I would also know the major events taking place in Nepal and elsewhere… I would also get some people to post their personal information.
It is very important to note Maiya’s ways of reading text on Facebook and Messenger. She said that she had forgotten what she had learnt in her childhood days. Digital space helped her to memorise alphabets and numbers that she read in her childhood. Her attempts to respond to the message on social media increased her passion for writing by herself.
Maiya’s voice is important to trace the increasing digital literacies; she started coding and decoding messages and news on Facebook. Rural women who could not complete formal basic school education interpreted news on social media. Likewise, another participant shared that using smart phones made her learn some digital skills, such as taking photos and sending them and sending voice messages. Chhoki: Initially, I could not write text on the cell phone, but I used to send voice messages. I usually send voice messages in a way, and I also get voice messages which I can understand easily. I would share the photos with my relatives by phone, though I could not take a good photo trying to take good photos of mine and others to send them.
Chhoki was also effortlessly working to learn to write on social media and respond to her friends and relatives. These tools were important to bring changes in their life and demonstrate how traditional ways of conducting literacy as first ideas have been displaced and replaced by smart phones. Sudha and Rupa also started learning the alphabet and numbers for sending messages and learning numeracy.
Learning numeracy added another asset to their life. These rural women collected fruits and vegetables from the local farmers and sold them in the nearby market. They started using calculators on their smart phone to calculate profits and losses. They also developed trading skills by using smart phones. Maiya: I feel more confident about returning money to the customers while selling seasonal fruits and vegetables in the local market. I have been earning money and could afford books and stationery for my children. Smart phone made my life easier. I also calculate my income while working as a daily basis wage labour.
Digital literacy has increased rural women’s ability to read, write and calculate by providing opportunities for income-generation activities. Such activities are only possible by connecting to customers and breaking the social barriers to working only at home. Sudha: I was trying to send a written message but could not. I am slowly learning to type texts. The combination of words appears, and I select the appropriate one and send it. I could see the photos on social media and get a sense of these pictures and messages. If I found something interesting, I asked about family members and friends. Chhoki: It was expensive when we did not have an internet connection in the past, but we did have an internet connection at present…this is affordable too. This is a unique device so that we do not need a camera, radio, and wristwatch and learning to use all these things in a single way… However, I have not learnt many things about it. Rupa: I have progressed a lot to send text message. information... information… (Pause..) maybe wrong information… has been prevailing and could not figure out which information is right. I usually checked the information about the migrant wage labourers in middle east countries…
These rural women’s experiences showed that learning to read and write (type) texts. Getting suggestions for possible text made their learning more convenient, and their communication and calculation skills have been improving. Digital literacy has been affecting rural women, and they can have their experiential learning experiences using digital tools and approaches to develop multiple literacies. The experience of these women showed that they were progressing in using technology to access information and disseminate it.
Discussion
Increasing digitisation has changed the ways of learning and education in the informal context of rural areas by using smart phones. Rural women’s access to smart phones has contributed a lot to spread digital tools in rural areas. The use of smart phone as a key digital tool has become a part of the everyday life of women in rural communities making it possible to enhance digital literacy skills through informal learning. Access of smart phone is responsible for bringing changes in the lifestyles of rural women thereby developing connectivity and communication with wider people (Gee, 2015). Despite low connectivity and lack of infrastructure, digital literacy and the motivation to become digitally literate have expanded in rural areas.
UNESCO reports that using mobile phones helps to gain information that rural people can use for community mobilisation (UNESCO, 2015). Learning basic digital skills makes their life more comfortable in rural areas by not only receiving and sending messages, thereby enhancing the learning of life-affirming skills. Rural women have developed a networked society holding together the relationships of individuals, households, groups/communities, and organisations (Castells, 2005). Digital literacy skills are learnt in such a complex network of relationships. The use of smart phones is an example of digital literacy in the context of literacy and learning of rural women in Nepal which helps to reduce the digital divide to ensure equitable access to education and learning in everyday life context.
Rural women were self-directed learning as they were motivated by themselves to adapt in the changing context of digital context. They learnt the knowledge and skills of operating smart phone in their context of human relationships (UNESCO, 2015). They mostly get help from others in the initial stage of using a smart phone. They got help from their family members, community members and shopkeepers; they experimented and practised and learnt through trial and error. They set their goals of operating Smart Phones, such as recharging the battery, finding their balance, and using an application such as radio, camera, and e-net data for Facebook and Messenger. From the case of using a smart phone in the digital age, rural women have their own choice of using smart phones. They operate the functions they need on their smart phone in everyday life. However, they are learning new features while they use a smart phone.
The fundamental rural women had such determination and responsibility that they learnt using smart phones more easily than reading and writing alphabets and numbers. Digital literacy is a more individual aspect, but the social context is also important as they learn from informal groups, family, neighbours, and society in the social context (Barton & Hamilton, 2000). These learning experiences of rural women show that digital literacy has been taking place in unplanned and informal ways as a new approach to post literacy (Rogers, 1994). They also demonstrate learning through hands-on experiences. Even the most marginalised women can develop such digital literacy practices through trial-and-error approaches. White et al. (2012) also argued that digital literacy could be developed by the trial-and-error approach without the direct support or advice of educational institutions and other interventions for the development. Taylor (2006) also indicated that everyday life learning followed the discovery approach as a trial and error where learners experimented with new ideas and committed errors to gain new ideas.
This evidence showed that most rural groups of adult women learn to use digital literacy by reading text, voice, code, and pictures and performing in their interaction with social media sites (James, 2020). Digital literacy has gradually replaced reading print material with virtual texts, symbols, and infographics. It was interesting to locate the learning contexts for digital literacy to figure out the digital skills, which include basic functions such as using voice messages instead of written messages, using touch screen technology, downloading apps, and using online operations among rural women.
Rural women used smart phones for personal and community use and practices for communication and developing their self-confidence. Such a rural setting could be the learning that seemed like the idea of the common good. Beach (2012) describes that community members can contribute and value literacy as the common good. (Beetham et al., 2009). Though the learning approaches are very informal and contextual, digital tools promote the literacies of rural women through the self-initiated, trial-and-error model. This model is important for developing literacy, even in rural areas.
Conclusion
The paper concludes that increased digitisation is not ubiquitous and that rural women continue to understand how technology and learning about technology are socially constructed. The paper has illuminated that phone in rural communities with low literacy rates as traditionally understood, smart phone use is engaging in a range of digital literacy practices. In this case, the paper indicates the policy implication for integrating informal digital learning approaches in the national literacy program. The smartphone is not only being used as a tool for communication but has become embedded in rural women’s cultural and social structures through which they cultivate their reading and writing skills. The use of digital tools for increasing communication skills, social networks, health and well-being tips, and other economic enhancements is possible to educate rural women via local and national development projects. Increased smartphone access provides the most marginalised groups with opportunities to boost their literacies. Rural women use and appropriate smart phone technology in their networks to enhance their roles within the family and community and their economic activities. In this case, the paper indicates possibilities of empowering rural women through increased access of the digitisation. We have suggested that these digital engagements are unstructured and informal learning forms. This paper concludes that recognising informal learning approaches using digital tools such as smartphones should be adopted in national literacy programmes.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
