Esther Mwema

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Esther Mwema

Internet Infrastructure . Digital Inequalities . Internet Governance

Esther Mwema is an award-winning artist who builds tools to solve digital inequalities and achieve social justice.

“Our imagination in the digital era should not be limited by the framing of big tech monopolies. Let’s put people back at the center of technology.”

—Esther Mwema

Read the paper by Esther Mwema and Dr. Abeba Birhane:
Undersea Cables in Africa - new frontiers of Digital Colonialism

Listen In on Esther’s Thoughts:

MOZILLA FESTIVAL HOUSE AMSTERDAM.
REVEALING THE INTERNET’S INVISIBLE CARBON FOOTPRINT.

BITS & BAUME.
COLONIAL IMAGINATIONS: BIG TECH AND UNDERSEA CABLES IN AFRICA

THE FEMININJA PODCAST.
DIGITAL COLONIALISM AND WHO OWNS OUR UNDERSEA CABLES.

VOICE OF PUBLIC INTEREST TECHNOLOGY PODCAST.
THE INTERSECTION OF ARTS, TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIAL IMPACT.

FUTURE MONEY F|M PODCAST.
SIKHULA SONKE: LIVING ARCHIVES OF AFROFUTURIST VILLAGE BANKING.

Connect to Esther’s Work:

Afro-Grids
Mozilla Creative Media Awardee. Internet infrastructure and digital colonialism in Africa.

Digital Grassroots
Founder. Leader in Action Coalition for Technology and Innovation for Gender Equality. Steering Committee in Feminist Accountability Framework.

Safety First for Girls (SAFIGI)
Founder . Creator of Holistic Safety Analysis and Intervention tool for at-risk girls.

Bow to Enter Heaven - Collection
Author and Book Cover Artist. Five Short Stories.

Digital Rights Monopoly Game
Co-Creator. Gamifying Digital Literacy.

Sikhula Sonke: Living Archives of Afrofuturist Village Banking
Future|Money Awardee. Creating living archives of village banking in Southern Africa.

Esther Mwema is an award-winning artist and digital inequalities expert from Zambia. Her focus is on Internet governance, digital colonialism and Internet infrastructure. She has over a decade of experience working at both the high level, such as at the UN, and at the grassroots level with the two organisations that she has founded: Digital Grassroots and SAFIGI Outreach Foundation. She is an Advisory Board Member of the Digital Democracy Initiave.

Esther graduated Summa Cum Laude in Multimedia Journalism from Ramkamhaeng University in Thailand; and is a senior Atlantic Fellow at the International Institute of Inequalities based at the London School of Economics and Political Science in the UK, graduating with an MSc in Inequalities and Social Sciences.

She is recipient of the Green Screen Coalition Catalyst Fund, C/Change R&D Creative lab, Prince Claus Seed Award Grant sponsored by the Ing Yoe Tan Foundation, and the Interledger Foundation Future|Money Art & Culture grant. She received the 2022 Mozilla Creative Media award. Esther is an Open Internet leader who prioritises African feminist and decolonial practices.

Work with Esther Mwema to innovate for a digital ecosystem that is equal and centered on human dignity.

Esther is open for collaborations as follows:

Literary Agent. Represent me and my Epic fantasy manuscript that displays a tapestry about how trauma shapes society; with themes of religion, migration, and loneliness embedded in a world of seadragons and deities.
Consultation. on Internet governance, Internet freedom, digital inequality, digital rights and innovation, centered on human rights and civil society. My expertise also extends to curriculum development and creative interventions.
Public speaking. paid speaking engagements, masterclasses and trainings on internet governance, grassroots organizing, and open Internet leadership.
Art. sponsor my abstract art exhibitions, storytelling - writing and live readings, poetry, and creative writing projects in fantasy and afro-futurism themes.
Funding and advancing the work of Digital Grassroots, Afro-Grids, Safety First for Girls, art and fiction writing.