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Payal Arora

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Payal Arora
Payal Arora in 2024
Born
Bengaluru, India
Alma materColumbia University
Harvard University
OccupationProfessor of Inclusive AI Cultures
EmployerUtrecht University
Known forThe Next Billion Users
AwardsErasmus University Rotterdam Education Prize (2017)
EUR Fellowship Award (2012)
Association of American Publishers PROSE award for Best book in Business, Management, and Finance (2020)
Websitepayalarora.com
https://femlab.co/
https://www.uu.nl/staff/PArora

Payal Arora is a digital anthropologist, author, and Professor and holds the Chair in Inclusive AI Cultures at Utrecht University.[1] She is the co-founder of FemLab, a feminist future of work initiative.[2] Her work focuses on internet usage in the Global South, specifically on global digital cultures, inequality and data governance. She is Indian, American, and Irish and currently lives in Amsterdam.

Career

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Payal Arora is a Professor and Chair in Inclusive AI Cultures at the department of Media and Culture Studies at Utrecht University. Prior to that, she was at Erasmus University Rotterdam for 15 years where she served as a Professor of Technology, Values and Global Media Cultures[3] and expert leader in UX Research and Global Tech Design at the Erasmus Center for Data Analytics.[4] In 2020, she co-founded FemLab, a feminist future of work initiative that translates digital ethnographic insights around user-experiences of women workers at the margins using digital tools into actionable policies and platform interventions.

She has extensively written on digital cultures and inequality in the Global South. She has authored and co-edited numerous papers and books and delivered hundreds of talks around the world, including two TEDx talks on the future of the internet[5] and on why we need less innovation.[6] Forbes called her “next billion champion”[7] in reference to her award-winning book[8] “The Next Billion Users: Digital Life Beyond the West”[9] which examines the online behavior of citizens in India, China, South Africa, Brazil, and the Middle East. The book has been featured by publications such as The Economist,[10] TechCrunch[11] and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.[12] Engadget stated that her Harvard book is one of “the most interesting, thought-provoking books on science and technology we can find.”[13]

In 2021, the UNHCR Innovation Services commissioned Arora to execute a field study and report on the digital leisure divide and the forcibly replaced in Brazil.[14] In 2016, she was commissioned by UNESCO to write up a report on prize-based incentives for innovations in ICTs in education which was presented at the Mobile Learning Week at UNESCO Paris.[15]

Arora is a member of several boards and advisory committees, including Facebook's Social Science One and ICRIER Prosus Centre for Internet and Digital Economy.[16] She is a Rockefeller Bellagio Resident Fellow.[17]

In 2017 her teaching was awarded with the Erasmus University Rotterdam's Education Prize.[18] She holds a Master's degree in International Development Policy from Harvard University and a doctoral degree in Language, Literacy & Technology from Columbia University.[19]

In the media

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Arora writes extensively about the impact of new digital technologies in the Global South, with a special focus on India, Brazil, Namibia, and Bangladesh where she conducted substantive fieldwork. She gets invited by public and private organizations to comment on how to build technologies that include the world. Her work has been featured in international media outlets including the Het Financieele Dagblad (Netherlands),[20] The Economist (UK),[21] Quartz (USA),[22] Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Germany),[23] Canadian Broadcasting Corporation,[24] De Standaard (Belgium),[25] and Times of India.[26]

She was invited on the popular "We the People" NDTV Indian Television Talk Show in 2019 to discuss "Is social media deciding self-worth?"[27] In 2020, she was invited on the award-winning podcast 99% Invisible on the theme ‘next billion users.’[28] On this podcast, she discussed with host Roman Mars on how these new online users are changing the ways in which we think and use technology. In 2020 she wrote an op-ed for NRC Handelsblad critiquing the viral essay by Rutger Bregman on "The real lord of the flies"[29] by arguing that it was a typical white savior focused story, and not representative of the historical colonial context.[30] She was an early contributor to the Ideas section for the award-winning[31] global media outlet Rest of World, with the opinion piece "AI isn’t going to save us."[32]

Bibliography

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  • Arora, Payal (2024). From pessimism to promise: lessons from the Global South on designing inclusive tech. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. ISBN 9780262049306.
  • Arora, Payal; Raman, Usha; König, René (2023). Feminist Futures of Work: Reimagining Labour in the Digital Economy. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. p. 348. ISBN 9789463728386.
  • Arora, Payal (2019). The next billion users : digital life beyond the West. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674983786.
  • Arora, Payal (2016). Leisure commons. Place of publication not identified: Routledge. ISBN 978-1138688049.
  • Been, Wouter (2015). Crossroads in new media, identity, and law : the shape of diversity to come. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-1137491251.
  • Arora, Payal (2010). Dot com mantra : social computing in the Central Himalayas. Burlington, VT: Ashgate. ISBN 978-1409401070.

References

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  1. ^ "Prof. dr. Payal Arora". Utrecht University. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  2. ^ "FemLab". Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  3. ^ "Payal Arora is appointed as Full Professor at ESPhil". Erasmus University Rotterdam. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  4. ^ "UX Research and Global Tech Design Design for the next billion users". Erasmus Center for Data Analytics. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  5. ^ "Who is in charge of the future of the internet? | Payal Arora | TEDxErasmusUniversity". YouTube. 10 January 2017. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  6. ^ "Why the World Needs less Innovation?". YouTube. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  7. ^ Armstrong, Paul (23 August 2019). "10,000 People In Copenhagen Are About To Determine A Better Future For You". Forbes. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  8. ^ "2020 Winners". Association of American Publishers. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  9. ^ Arora, Payal (2019). The Next Billion Users: Digital Life Beyond the West. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674983786.
  10. ^ "How the pursuit of leisure drives internet use". The Economist. 8 June 2019. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  11. ^ Crichton, Danny (8 March 2019). "Who are the next billion users and what do they want". Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  12. ^ van Blazekovic, Jessica (1 April 2019). ""Jetzt gehen selbst die ärmsten Menschen online"". Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  13. ^ Tarantola, Andrew. "Hitting the Books: Modern surveillance and 'the science of happiness'". Engadget. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  14. ^ "The Digital Leisure Divide and the Forcibly Displaced" (PDF). UNHCR. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  15. ^ "Dr. Arora to be Project leader for UNESCO Report on prize-based incentives for innovations in ICT's in Education". Erasmus University Rotterdam. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  16. ^ "Advisory Board". ICRIER Prosus Centre for Internet and Digital Economy. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  17. ^ "The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center Announces 2023 Residents and Opens Call for 2024 Applicants". The Rockefeller Foundation. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  18. ^ "Payal Arora receives Education Prize". Erasmus University Rotterdam. 5 September 2017. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  19. ^ "Curriculum Vitae" (PDF). Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  20. ^ Arora, Payal. "Techbedrijven onderschatten de kracht van het mondiale Zuiden". Financieele Dagblad. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  21. ^ "How the pursuit of leisure drives internet use". The Economist. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  22. ^ Arora, Payal. "The biggest myths about the next billion internet users". Quartz. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  23. ^ von Blazekovic, Jessica. "„Jetzt gehen selbst die ärmsten Menschen online"". Frankfurter Allgemeine. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  24. ^ "Despite limited access, online habits of the developing world aren't that different from ours". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  25. ^ "'Dat armen internet vooral gebruiken voor entertainment? So what?'". De Standaard.
  26. ^ Shastri, Parth. "Girls online have hacks against patriarchal wall". Times of India. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  27. ^ "We The People: Is Social Media Deciding Self-Worth?". NDTV. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  28. ^ "The Next Billion Users". 99% Invisible. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  29. ^ Bregman, Rutger. "The real Lord of the Flies: what happened when six boys were shipwrecked for 15 months". The Guardian. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  30. ^ Arora, Payal. "Altijd maar weer die witte redders". NRC. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  31. ^ "Awards & Recognition". Rest of World. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  32. ^ Arora, Payal. "AI isn't going to save us". Rest of World. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
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