In my digital community engagement pedagogical practices, students become content creators and interact with the people and places they seek to represent. They leave their comfort zones to talk to new people, learn how to establish reciprocal partnerships with community contacts, explore neighborhoods on foot, and come to understand their own subject position in relationship to others. As they do so, they have a greater sense of their digital audiences and the stories they hope to share with them.
My work with students and community members centers a place-based approach as a means of shaping digital spaces more equitably. Using intersectional feminism, critical race theory, cultural geography, and science and technology studies, I consider how digital collaborations can help participants re-orient themselves and their identities in relationship to others. My current book project Creating a Sense of Place with Digital Community Engagement is a guide for community members, scholars, and students of all levels about how to establish, manage, and maintain digital community engagement projects.
