Share yourself first: exploring strategies for the creation of locative content for and by low-literacy communities

This paper explores motivations and strategies for fostering the production of locative storytelling among underserved communities, specifically the demographic group of Latinos facing the legacy of racial segregation in central Texas. We report on the findings from ethnographic fieldwork conducted in the context of a community computer training program provided by a non-profit organization that partnered with us. We trained a group of adults in locative and mobile media and asked them to choose meaningful locations in the neighborhood in which they live and produce related written stories. Results from the study shed light on the motivations (or lack of) for participating in locative media practices, highlighting in particular that individual mentorship and rapport-building through the sharing of personal content are key strategies in engaging these communities in locative media in general and content sharing specifically.