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I am researcher who studies the intersection of technology and migration in urban environments.  I am interested in the increased access and constraints that come along with new information communication technologies (ICTs).  My regions of interest are marginalized and low-income communities in China, India, US and Mexico.  Before joining UC San Diego’s Sociology Ph.D. Program, I worked in New York City developing digital literacy programs in low-income communities.  You can find my blog on Chinese youth culture, media, and technology at YouMeiTI.

1 Minute Version

I am researcher who studies the intersection of technology and migration in urban environments.  I am interested in the increased access and constraints that come along with new information communication technologies (ICTs).  My research is on (1) emerging practices of ICT usage among rural-urban migrants--in particular new forms of urban citizenship; (2) how citizenship and telecommunication policy factor into the incorporation of migrants in the urban space; and (3) new practices that emerge as a response to ICT policies.  My regions of interest are marginalized and low-income communities in China, India, US and Mexico.   My research methods are based in ethnography and quantitative ethno-survey methods.

 

For my planned disseration work in China in 2009-2010, I will focus on how transnational digital infrastructures of information (e.g. the Internet) and nation- specific forms of communication (e.g. cellphone infrastructure) form as social structures that complexly shape migrant’s communication practices.  On another level, I am particularly interested in how practice shapes and is shaped by the architecture of physical and virtual space.  To arrive at a better understanding of these processes, I will examine the use of Internet cafes and cellphones by migrant populations in Shanghai, China.  My research fills in oversights from urbanization and policy studies by articulating inequality as embedded in virtual spaces and in the digital infrastructures and policies that support access or denial to everyday physical and digital spaces.

 

My experience in community organizing, media production, and cultural programming has enabled me to bring a strong inter-disciplinary approach to my academic work. Before joining UC San Diego’s Sociology Ph.D. Program, I worked in New York City, San Francisco and San Diego developing digital literacy programs in low-income communities for the likes of the United Nations, NASA (National Aeronautics Space Agency), Student Planet (Beijing), and the New York City public school system.  My teaching methodology drew upon narratives that were reflective of my students, this included popular media from hip-hop culture to web blogs. 

 

The communities I worked with tended to be ignored by technology companies as serious users and creators. My work was an attempt to address this oversight. I eventually realized that technology-based literacy programs were limited in their effectiveness over time, as these were short-term solutions to larger external problems.  The scope of the problem extended beyond the community to larger issues around policy and technology design.   Many ICT policies did not seem to take into account low-income users.   In order to better  understand the intersection of policy and practice, I went to graduate school to learn how  to conduct research within communities, and to contribute my research findings to better inform ICT policy makers, software engineers, and product designers about the everyday lives of low-income users.  

 

I am currently a lead co-researcher on a long-term project at the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies that studies ICT usage in a Mexican immigrant sending and US receiving community.  I am also affiliated with the India Project Group at the California Institute of Technology (CalIT2).  In addition I am a co-researcher on popular discourse surrounding the Beijing Olympic Torch.  My work on US-based ICT policy examines how internet access can be framed as a social right in a social democratic framework.  I also advise freeDimensional, a non-profit based in NYC that links artists to social justice movements.  I work on freelance projects on a consultancy basis.  You can find my blog about Chinese youth culture, media, and technology at YouMeiTI and my personal blog at Hi Tricia.

 

 

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