Co-founder of CivicTechTO and self-declared certified nerd, Anowa Quarcoo chats with Elizabeth about the idea of citizenship. They talk about legal and cultural definitions of citizenship before jumping into a discussion of what counts as a citizen in a digital era. From civic leaders, to publics, to users, to citizens - they talk about how some terms can be empowering while others can be exclusionary. Key take-away? Context matters. You need to ask why you are trying to define a group with this kind of term and pick accordingly.

Additional Resources

There are a lot of definitions of citizenship out there. Elizabeth summarizes legal and cultural definitions quickly in the episode, drawing on what she and Florian Martin-Bariteau wrote in their Introduction to the Citizenship in a Connected Canada book (available open access!).

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Check out www.polcommtech.ca for annotated transcripts of this episode in English and French.