Seeding change: Meet Hackers Comunitarias, the women challenging communications, tech and access inequalities in Mexico

“From being women, and also Indigenous women, we begin to notice that it is possible to tell other stories from ourselves.”

“Our community, like many other communities, faces a technological backwardness as well as inequalities in terms of access to technologies and communication channels.”

“With this clear idea we began to dream on the intranet, a situation that led us to find those allies along the way who are always there to share their knowledge and to build with us, with all the patience and affection that may exist.”

“In Xamoneta's journey we identify not only having a server with an operating system that works, but thanks to those who share free software, also knowing how to align an antenna, knowing what a node is, imagining how networks are interconnected in the spectrum, as if we embroidered together some of the garments that we usually wear.”

“We find ourselves being able to take a screwdriver, a drill, checking a memory card, taking apart and putting together the server, which translates into breaking fears and changing stereotypes.”

“From the community and supporting each other because yes, as women we also have these spaces, we can also use those tools that had not been thought of as being for us.”

“We are going to present the Xamoneta intranet that is built from the community sense, changing the logic of the powerful, so that the power that these tools represent passes to the local, to the collective, to the community, through the actions of women.”

"We are proud of being more sure of ourselves."

"And also proud of understanding what we are doing technically, and that the process is being carried out with great care, affection and patience, in the different territories."

“We still have a long way to go, but these meetings, supports, knowledge, methodologies and shared ways make our path clearer and the horizon looks attainable.”

“In Xocoyolo, we began with a first meeting between women from the community.”

“The objective was to create a safe space among women to break stereotypes, strengthen autonomy, build trust and break dependencies through the appropriation of technology.

“We asked ourselves, ‘What is technology?’ And we all drew what we understood about it.”

“In the beginning, almost all the women drew devices such as mobile phones or computers. It was at that moment that we realised that technology goes beyond digital.”

“Technology is everything that intervenes to facilitate a process. From this discovery, we proceeded to ask, ‘What technologies exist in Xocoyolo?’ And we began to talk about the technologies that served us at home such as the machete, planting techniques and other older technologies such as iron plates or gas lamps.”

“As we shared about the technologies, we realised that at the same time that we were talking about technology, we were creating the space of trust that we were looking for.”

“The most beautiful thing about this process is that it helped us lose our fear of the technical part. The concept of ‘being afraid of technology’ was reframed to ‘feeling ashamed of what others will say because they don't know how it works and how to use technology’.”

“A space of trust was created between women.”

“A space of trust was created between women.”