Cidadania, transformação digital e as pessoas idosas de Santa Cruz do Sul.

Abstract

This master's thesis reflects on two themes that affect the dynamics of the territories: population aging and the advancement of Communication and Information Technologies - ICTS, especially the internet. Thus, supported by the theory of Development as Freedom (SEN, 2000), we went through this study with a look at the elderly individual's ability to interact with the internet and transform the territory in which he acts as an agent. In this sense, the general objective of investigation of this study was to understand how the elderly in Santa Cruz do Sul perceive access to the Internet as an information tool and if it could contribute to the expansion of their capabilities to exercise citizenship. We also seek to analyze how they perceive themselves in a connected society, to know the understanding of them about citizenship in old age, to identify how they become aware of their rights and duties as citizens and to understand how they appropriate the internet as an informative tool. Twenty elderly people living in the urban area of the municipality of Santa Cruz do Sul, in Rio Grande do Sul, were interviewed, and the content analysis technique was used to reinterpret the content of the interviews, offering an understanding of their meanings. In the end, it may be concluded that Internet is named as one of the main instrumental freedoms to improve the citizenship of elderly people interviewed in the municipality of Santa Cruz do Sul. It is a communication and information tool that has naturally been incorporated into their routines and taking on a larger dimension as they have become more comfortable in expanding its uses and discovering new features such as video, relationship and news. Although the environment of many possibilities is a little scary at first, it is possible to perceive the fascination, the recognition for something that, as said by an interviewee, made it possible to go from dark to light, from the point of view of knowledge. And these people although they have lived their childhood and youth in a time of deprivation of liberties today, thanks to the advancement of ICTs, freedom of speech and information is at your fingertips. This statement it is possible from several statements pointed from interviews analysis.