Data Journalism in favela: Made by, for, and about Forgotten and Marginalized Communities

ABSTRACT

In Brazil, inequalities are visually represented in its favelas. These neighborhoods are usually comprised of low-income informal settlements neglected by governments and often forgotten by mainstream media. The pervasive nature of information and communications technology (ICT) has brought new ways to produce news content in the media industry, giving voice to these communities. Thus, small, alternative, community, or non-mainstream media became a vital terrain of opposition activism. Drawing on user participation, collaboration, and data journalism theories, this article analyzes three alternative media organizations (Agência Mural, data_labe, and Favela em Pauta), which proposed producing data-driven content by, for, and about favelas through a mixed-method research design. Results show that four contributing factors tend to help these organizations to produce data stories despite these challenges: citizen participation, activism, collaboration, and humanizing data. The article concludes by demonstrating how elements developed in these initiatives and presents an agenda for future research.

KEYWORDS:

• Data journalism
• favela
• alternative media
• Brazil
• collaborative journalism
• participatory journalism
• audience participation

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 More than 2 million of São Paulo's city population lives in slums. Retrieved from https://32xsp.org.br/2018/11/14/mais-de-2-milhoes-de-paulistanos-ainda-moram-em-favelas/. Accessed in January 2021.

National Housing Day: Brazil has 11.4 million people living in slums. Retrieved from https://www.agenciadenoticias.ibge.gov.br/agencia-noticias/2012-agencia-de-noticias/noticias/15700-dados-do-censo-2010-mostram-11-4-milhoes-de-pessoas-vivendo-em-favelas. Accessed in January 2021.

2 Agência Mural's blog online website of Folha de S.Paulo. Retrieved from https://mural.blogfolha.uol.com.br/projeto_mural/. Accessed in January 2021.

3 32XSP. https://32xsp.org.br/. Accessed in February 2021.

4 “Da quebrada” is a slang that means something around “alternative place,” also means “in the corner”, but, in general, is used in the context of slums of peripheral areas. Giro da Quebrada. Retrieved from https://www.agenciamural.org.br/parcerias/giro-da-quebrada-band-sp/. Accessed in January 2021.

5 CocoZap is a project of mapping, incidence and citizen participation on basic sanitation in Maré, a Rio's favela. https://cocozap.datalabe.org/. Accessed in February 2021.

6 MapaCoronaNasPeriferias (Map of COVID in the peripheries). Retrieved from https://favelaempauta.com/mapa-corona-periferias-zap/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=%23MapaCoronaNasPeriferias. Accessed in January 2021.

Additional information

Funding

This project is funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska Curie grant agreement No 765140.