Audience Tools

Jason Young

CV Senior Research Scientist, Technology & Social Change Group, Affiliate Assistant Professor
Gerberding Hall 054

Affiliate Positions

  • Research Fellow, Center for an Informed Public
  • Affiliate Assistant Professor, UW Information School
  • Affiliate Instructor, UW Jackson School of International Studies

Specializations

  • Misinformation & Digital Literacy
  • Digital Knowledge Politics
  • ICT & Development

Research Areas

Biography

Jason Young is a Senior Research Scientist and Affiliate Assistant Professor at the Information School, with affiliations to the Technology & Social Change Group (TASCHA), the Center for an Informed Public (CIP), and the Jackson School of International Studies. Jason's work explores the politics that shape what forms of knowledge come to matter within different socio-cultural contexts. His research asks, for example, how the use of information & communication technologies (ICTs) are reshaping colonial hierarchies that exist between Indigenous and Western scientific knowledge systems, and how socio-cultural and emotional dynamics produce vulnerabilities and attachments to misinformation. Jason's projects strongly emphasize community-based, participatory approaches with applied goals, but are also inspired by and draw from a broad range of critical social theory. He is particularly interested in collaborations, and in working with students, in areas related to the following active projects:

Co-Designing for Trust - This NSF-funded project is a collaboration between academic and community researchers, librarians, educators, and other partners working to design community-oriented solutions to misinformation. The project seeks to create locally-contextualized digital literacy resources that holistically address the ways that misinformation exploits our minds, emotions, and social circumstances.

Exploring the Benefits and Challenges of Community-Powered Connectivity in the New Arctic - This NSF-funded planning grant explores the potential role of community networks - or, telecommunications infrastructure designed, implemented, and managed by communities - in addressing existing digital divides for Arctic Indigenous communities.

Innovations for Community-Held Infrastructure - This project, funded by the NSF Smart and Connected Community program, is co-developing new technologies (e.g., edge services, wireless sensors) that make community networks more useful and empowering for urban BIPOC communities.

Co-Designing Civic Education in the Circumpolar North - This NSF-funded planning grant supports an international set of collaborators to develop a research agenda for designing and implementing civic education approaches contextualized to the Arctic.

Advancing Library Visibility in Africa (ALVA) - This project, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, develops tools to support public library systems across the African continent as they engage in locally-relevant sustainable development efforts.

Indigenous Connectivity - This project seeks to design and implement community networks for and with Indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon. It explores the ways in which digital technologies produce new opportunities for Indigenous communities to engage in collective environmental politics and cultural regeneration, while simultaneously reproducing epistemic and colonial hierarchies within those politics.

Education

  • Ph D, Geography, University of Washington, 2017
  • MA, Geography, University of Washington, 2012
  • BA, Geography, Miami University (Ohio), 2009

Publications and Contributions

  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    What makes an ideal partner? African libraries and neoliberal discourses in international development (2022)
    Applied Linguistics Authors: Renee Lynch, Jason C Young, Chris Jowaisas, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Joel Sam
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Public Libraries and Development Across Sub-Saharan Africa: Overcoming a Problem of Perception (2021)
    Libri Authors: Jason Young, Renee Lynch, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Chris Jowaisas, Joel Sam
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    African Libraries in Development: Perceptions and Possibilities (2020)
    International Information & Library Review Authors: Renee Lynch, Jason Young, Chris Jowaisas, Stanley Boayke-Achampong, Joel Sam
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Benefits of Crowdsourcing for Libraries in the Global South: A Case Study from Africa (2020)
    IFLA Journal Authors: Renee Lynch, Jason Young, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Chris Jowaisas, Joel Sam, Bree Norlander
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Benefits of Crowdsourcing for Libraries in the Global South: A Case Study from Africa (2020)
    The IFLA Journal Authors: Renee Lynch, Jason Young, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Chris Jowaisas, Joel Sam
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Data challenges for public libraries: African perspectives and the social context of knowledge (2020)
    Information Development Authors: Renee Lynch, Jason Young, Chris Jowaisas, Maria Garrido, Joel Sam, Stanley Boakye-Achampong
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Disinformation as the weaponization of cruel optimism: A critical intervention in misinformation studies (2020)
    Emotion, Space and Society Author: Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Environmental colonialism, digital indigeneity, and the politicization of resilience (2020)
    Environmental Planning E: Nature and Space 0(0), pp. 1-22 Author: Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    The Role of Libraries in Misinformation Programming: A Research Agenda (2020)
    Journal of Librarianship and Information Science Authors: Jason Young, Brandyn Boyd, Katya Yefimova, Stacey Wedlake, Christopher Coward
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Volunteer geographic information in the Global South: barriers to local implementation of mapping projects across Africa (2020)
    GeoJournal Authors: Jason Young, Renee Lynch, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Chris Jowaisas, Joel Sam, Bree Norlander
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Volunteer geographic information in the Global South: barriers to local implementation of mapping projects across Africa (2020)
    GEOJOURNAL, ISBN/ISSN: 0343-2521 Authors: Jason Young, Renee Lynch, Stanley Boakye-Achampong, Chris Jowaisas, Joel Sam, Bree Norlander
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Rural digital geographies and new landscapes of social resilience (2019)
    Journal of Rural Studies Author: Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    The new knowledge politics of digital colonialism (2019)
    Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space Author: Jason Young
  • Book, Chapter in Scholarly Book-New
    Knowledge Politics (2018)
    Digital Geographies Author: Jason Young
  • Book, Reprint in Translation
    Ukiuqta'qtumi-Hivuniptingun – One Arctic, One Future (2018)
    One Arctic: The Arctic Council and Circumpolar Governance Authors: Nadine C Fabbi, Jason Young, Eric W Finke
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Canadian Inuit, digital qanuqtuurunnarniq, and emerging geographic imaginations (2017)
    Geoforum, 86(Unknown Issue), pp. 53-62 Author: Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Participatory Uses of Geospatial Technologies to Leverage Multiple Knowledge Systems within Development Contexts (2017)
    World Development, 93(Unknown Issue), pp. 389-401 Authors: Jason Young, Michael Gilmore
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Polar Bear Management in a Digital Arctic: Inuit Perspectives Across the Web (2016)
    The Canadian Geographer, 60(4), pp. 574-91 Author: Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Subaltern empowerment in the Geoweb: Tensions between publicity and privacy (2014)
    Antipode, 46(2), pp. 574-91 Authors: Jason Young, Michael P Gilmore
  • Journal Article, Professional Journal
    The Spatial Politics of Affect and Emotion in Participatory GIS (2013)
    Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 103(4) Authors: Jason Young, Michael P Gilmore
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    The use of participatory mapping in ethnobiological research, biocultural conservation, and community empowerment: a case study from the Peruvian Amazon (2012)
    Journal of Ethnobiology, 32(1), pp. 6-29 Authors: Michael P Gilmore, Jason Young
  • Book, Chapter in Scholarly Book-New
    The Maijuna Participatory Mapping Project: Mapping the Past and the Present for the Future (2010)
    Peru: Maijuna Authors: Michael P Gilmore, Jason Young
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Gender dynamics in high school policy debate: Propagating gender hierarchies in advocating 'better' futures
    Gender and Education Authors: Stella Robertson, Petra Zuniga, Hannah Christenson, Jason Young

Presentations

  • Community Approaches to Misinformation (2021)
    UW iSchool - Virtual
  • Development Organization Interviews: Perceptions and Possibilities for African Libraries (2021)
    African Library & Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA) - Online
  • Library Survey: Current Data Practices in African Libraries (2021)
    African Library & Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA) - Online
  • Panel Discussion: Recommendations from the ALVA Pro (2021)
    African Library & Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA) - Online
  • Advancing Library Visibility in Africa (2019)
    3rd African Library & Information Associations & Institutions (AfLIA) Conference & 5th African Library Summit - Nairobi
  • Knowledge Politics Across Digital Divides: Environmental Change, Indigeneity, and Technology Use in the Arctic
    Development Studies Association 2018 Conference - Manchester, UK