Looking for Wifi
New Digital Literacy Sites in Dili, Timor-Leste
In December 2014, I visited Dili on the occasion of a series of meetings dealing with the dissemination of the outcomes of the research project ‘Becoming a Nation of Readers: Language Policy and Adult Literacy Education in Multilingual Timor-Leste’, which was carried out by researchers from Tilburg University and Leiden University (the Netherlands), the University of Birmingham (United Kingdom) and the National University of Timor-Leste and the National Institute of Linguistics in Dili (Timor-Leste)
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As with earlier literacy studies focused on the then newly discovered literacy sites such as the public notice boards I found on the campus of the National University of Timor-Leste, contemporary literacy studies should investigate these new digital literacy sites, and the new sociotechnical semiotic practices they involve as part of the linguistic landscape. Questions to be explored include: where can such new digital literacy sites be found; what are the (linguistic, cultural, socio-economic) characteristics of people engaged in digital literacies; what languages and/or combinations of languages and what scripts are used in digital literacy practices; what about linguistic normativity in digital literacy practices; what are the topics dealt with in digital literacy practices; what networks are people linked to when engaging in digital literacy practices; what about commercial and financial aspects of digital literacy practices; how can digital literacy practices be used for teaching and learning, e.g., for becoming literate; how does analog compare to digital literacy skills of those visiting and using new digital literacy sites?