Access and Beyond: An Intersectional Approach to Women’s Everyday Experiences with ICTs

Abstract

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are seen as the pathway not just to(economic) development, but key to ensuring good governance and removing social inequality.At the heart of this narrative is the assumption that technology is neutral and an a priori sourcefor good which can be used for the inclusion of marginalised communities. Through in‐depthinterviews with working class women in New Delhi, India, my paper seeks to understand howan intersectional social location affects women’s experiences with ICTs, and argues that theyare mired in complex ways with structures of caste, gender, class and education. The studybuilds on feminist insights that technology must be seen as a set of practices, deeply implicatedin power relations. Thus, young women’s usage of mobile phones is shaped by upper-castenorms of femininity. For other women, ICTs become a nuisance which allow employers moreaccess to them. This paper underscores the importance of a more bottom-up understanding ofthe ways in which technology and society shape each other, and reflects on implications forpolicymaking and future scholarship.