Technologies and African Societies in Pandemic Times: Using Technology to Survive and Thrive During the Covid-19 Era [Hardcover]

In February 2020, the Coronavirus pandemic became a worldwide health emergency, and in April of that year, the ITU and the WHO created a joint declaration to show their commitment to using ICTs to overcome the pandemic.

Technologies and African Societies in Pandemic Times explores the impact of Covid-19 on African societies in North and West Africa through the lens of technology and social media.

The authors of this book highlight how everyday people dealt with the pandemic from its onset, through the process of the development of the vaccine and to its eventual dissemination. This book tells stories of survival, of coping and, eventually, of economically thriving.

The authors also describe how, in this extremely challenging moment for humanity, people used music, art and social media to reinvent the community, to share joy and pain and to try to remain connected.

Foreword xi
Mohamed SALIOU CAMARA

Introduction xv
Jean-Jacques Maomra BOGUI and Nanga D?sir? COULIBALY

Part 1 Covid-19, Information, and Communication 1

Chapter 1 Reinventing Everyday Life in the Covid-19 Era: The Uses of Information and Communication Technologies as Tactics in an Abidjanese Ordinary Courtyard 3
Youssouf SOUMAHORO

1.1 Introduction 3

1.1.1 Context and positioning of the research problem 3

1.1.2 Field and methods 5

1.2 Results 6

1.2.1 Social relational uses 6

1.2.2 Hedonic and playful uses 8

1.2.3 Emerging from the inactivity brought about by the pandemic 9

1.2.4 Uses for information retrieval and educational purposes 10