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Rising Voices note: Our monthly newsletter provides a summary of our recent blog posts about all aspects of digital inclusion including access to and adoption of digital tools, as well as different ways and opportunities for communities to fully participate online. Read here for previous editions of this newsletter.

How are you doing, dear readers?

We are now in August and this call for Young Journalist Award submissions is closing soon! If you are a young journalist, aged 30 and under, and have done some great work in investigative journalism, this would be a great opportunity for you to shine and to share your work with a wider audience. Or, maybe you’ll consider submitting your work next year?

More on the Thomson Foundation’s Award can be found here. Submission due: August 11, 2023 at midnight (GMT)

Interested in learning first hand about how the internet and technology play a role in the promotion and revitalization of Indigenous, minority, endangered, or under-resourced languages? Rising Voices and partners are now bringing to you a new round of our rotating Twitter campaigns for 2023, featuring language digital activists around the world each week. Come follow us and hear what they have to share!

@ActLenguas (Latin America)

• Yulma Rodríguez [es]: a teacher based in Mexico, who’s convinced that it is important to involve all generations, young and old, in the preservation of the Ch'ol language and its culture
• Carlos Ángeles [es]: a young Zapotec based in Mexico, who has worked to preserve/promote local indigenous languages through social networks
• Celfa K'ujul [es]: a native speaker of Maya-Tseltal, who dedicated herself to bringing a Tzeltal digital magazine to life so as to keep the language on the digital map and from being forgotten
• Felipe de Jesús Kuyoc: a Mayan language activist who believes that children should grow up seeing their own language in a positive light and educators like himself should strive to provide such opportunities

@DigiAfricanLang (Africa)

• Toroga Denver: a multi-talented language and cultural activist who’s dedicated himself to the revitalization of the Khoekhoe and N|uu languages (both First languages of South Africa)
• Umasoye: a Nigerian born writer, who strives to leverage her love of technology for the revitalization of the Ekpeye language, an Indigenous language that’s at risk of going extinct

Meanwhile, we’d love to share two posts with you, in which you can learn about how language activists in Africa and India are striving to promote online presence of their languages as well as meaningful participation of those who speak these languages.
→ How Africans are bridging the language digital divide
→ How India's Ho- and Santali-language content creators are holding space for Indigenous linguistic assertion

Are you or your organization interested in exploring how AI has impacted — or might impact — people day in and day out across eastern and southern Africa? If you are and are in need of some financial support to push through your research, it might be worth your while to take a look at Mozilla’s Africa Innovation Mradi Research Grants. Application due: August 14, 2023 at 5pm (East African Time)

Are you up for a challenge to empower organizations with generative AI? Seeking to “democratize and reimagine the use of data” in addressing today’s challenges and to improve lives globally, data.org and partners are offering a grant — and more, in fact — for those who are interested in the training and upskilling of teams on generative AI for social impact (details here). Application due: August 15, 2023

Do you care for a better, more equitable data ecosystem? Mozilla’s Data Futures Lab has the same vision and would like to support this goal by way of its Infrastructure Fund. On top of the financial resources, awardees can also expect to have networking opportunities as well as outreach support through Mozilla. For more info and to apply, please visit the official site. Application due: August 31, 2023

In preparation for the 5th Digital Citizen Summit taking place this November, the Digital Empowerment Foundation and Center for Development Policy and Practice are calling for workshop proposals that will look into challenges concerning democracy and digital governance with human rights in mind. Further details in regard to this call can be found here.  Note: Proposals are to be selected on a rolling basis

• The Australian Digital Inclusion Index via the official website

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