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yuti — March 11, 2008 / 2:52 am
“Rigid technologies don’t translate successfully from the North to the South.” (Akrich, 1992)
Often, wells are drilled by NGOs purely on the basis of geological survey. However, in a country like Zimbabwe such wells do not always work. Even though the water that the well produces may be abundant and clear, and even though the new well may be nearer for its (intended) users than an older one that it is meant to replace, you may see a path traced out in the sand that leads around it. If the village women do not want to use the well, if it has been bored without consulting the nganga or was put into operation without his consent, the well is dead. Sometimes literally. There are instances in which a well was bored without the nganga’s approval and, contrary to all measurements, turned out to be dry. Not a drop of water. And unfortunately, boring wells without consulting the nganga has happened all too often, especially when NGOs or governments are determined to keep the sitting and boring of the well entirely in their own hands (UNICEF Zimbabwe, interviewed by de Laet and Mol).
What Akrich, and later, de Laet and Mol said shows that technology can’t be diffuse rather been translate. In translation process, the technology found it new shape, and social construction.
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