Rethinking Digital Divides: a qualitative examination of technology, place, and capital in rural Ontario

Abstract

This thesis investigates how urban-rural digital divides are imagined by Canadian broadband policies, and how these narratives compare to the lived experience of rural residents of Kapuskasing, Ontario. In doing so, this project critiques two underlying assumptions in federal policies: 1) that digital communication technologies ‘develop’ rural communities by superseding rural practices, and 2) that technology inherently fosters the skills necessary to overcome existing social inequalities. Of interest in this research are the patterns of technology domestication, and how ‘rurality’ might influence the practices of residents in these locales. The analysis reveals some of the ways in which rural residents have agency in processes of technology domestication and suggests that existing inequalities are as likely to shape the adoption, use, and outcomes of new digital technologies as they are to be overcome by them.