"What is the minimum basket of digital goods, services, and skills households need to live and participate in the digital world?"

This paper presents the overall results of the ‘Minimum Digital Living Standard’ (MDLS) project which addresses this question using a novel household-based assessment of digital needs. The project:

• Drew on the Minimum Income Standard methodology to develop a definition of MDLS through four rounds of deliberative focus groups that established a ‘minimum basket of digital goods, services, and skills’ that households with dependent-age children need to be digitally included.
• A UK-wide national survey (n=1582 households) with statistical and geographic evaluations of MDLS to explore correspondence with other social, economic, cultural, and digital measures.
• Undertook multiple in-depth interviews and group consultations with stakeholders representing a variety of communities at risk of digital exclusion, to explore the relevance of the standard regarding key dimensions of lived experience and intersectionality, such as disability, ethnicity, rurality, and poverty.
• Involved ongoing engagement with government, regional, public and third-sector organisations to explore the use of MDLS as a tool to inform policy development.

Findings: 45% of UK households with children lack either the equipment and/or skills needed to meet the MDLS. That is 3.69M households with children. The key predictors of not meeting the MDLS are household deprivation, social class, household composition (single parent, and/or 2+ children), ethnicity, chronic health or disability, urbanity, unemployment, and receipt of benefits.

This UK nationwide project was funded by the Nuffield Foundation, Nominet and the Welsh Government.

The paper employs Worrell’s concept of “digital brokering” (Worrell, 2021) to argue, firstly, that diasporic youth play a key role in sustaining and maintaining transnational family connections, using their digital literacy skills to negotiate literacy barriers of older family members, and that WhatsApp is a key site for these negotiations. Secondly, the paper will offer insights into how these brokering activities were extended beyond the family to transnational community contexts, where examples of WhatsApp digital brokering ranged from: building and participating in transnational networks and movements, addressing COVID-19 misinformation and educating community about COVID-19 safety in cross-border digital campaigns. Finally, we argue that these digital brokering practices constitute novel practices of digital citizenship.

This study explores the intricate convergence of Afrophobia and its projection through (Cyber)Bullying for youth of African descent in Greece. It comprehensively documents the colonialistic nature of the internet and Western scholarship in perpetuating racial (cyber)bullying. Furthermore, the study experiments with the idea of Collective Critical Consciousness and its application to transform the internet into a race-sensitive industry.

The study bridges the gap in racially sensitive, decolonial research on (Cyber)Bullying by involving those affected as knowledge-holders in Creative Participatory Action Research. The findings advance AfroGreek youth's proclamation of social media as a breeding ground for racism and how their proactive participation can help reshape the internet. It also results in developing Critical Consciousness as mapped out through the knowledge-holders' involvement in Critical Action, Political Self-Efficacy, and Critical Reflection.

The output actively contributes to creating impactful internet-based interventions and towards a more inclusive and informed societal framework. Finally, the study proves the efficacy of critical and diverse involvement through the launch of a youth-directed Anti-Bullying Collective.

The relationship between digital practices, gender, and intimacy in teenagers’ everyday life is gaining growing attention. We can look at digital media as environments that offer young people agency and spaces where they can construct and perform their identity (boyd 2014) through bricolage practices (Willett 2008) and by experimenting with their own selves, also with regard to gender and intimacy (Ferreira 2021; Metcalfe & Llewellyn 2020; Scarcelli 2015; De Ridder 2017; Livingstone & Mason 2015). Studies have also devoted attention to communicative interactions (e.g.,“sexting”), investigating both the incorporation of and resistance to specific gender and sexual ideologies (Ringrose et al. 2013; Scarcelli 2020).

The aim of our paper is to analyse how Italian teenagers (aged 15-18) (re)define their understanding of gender and intimacy by engaging with digital media and incorporating it into their daily lives. In the first step of our research we are conducting six focus groups with students (15-18) from secondary schools in six cities located in three Italian regions. In the second step, we will carry out in depth semi-structured interviews with teenagers. The combination of these methods will allow to explore topics such as teenagers' digital practices in relation to performing gender identities and sexual orientation on different platforms; teens’ interaction with others in relation to intimate practices; the use of specific platforms for homosocial interaction; use of digital resources to seek information about gender; digital media representations. Results cover a wide set of digital practices, organised along three (interrelated) dimensions: gender, sexuality and intimate relationships.