INFRASTRUCTURES

Through our work at Kaleidos’ PRIDE lab, we operate within numerous infrastructures. Kaleidos is situated within two top-level Ecuadorian universities (University of Cuenca and FLACSO Ecuador) that provide a research community of scholars and activists who share a deep commitment to policy reform and the production of critical knowledges on pressing issues, such as LGBTQ rights. Kaleidos also has provided an interdisciplinary framework for us to approach this work.

The PRIDE lab works closely with the radio program “Sin Etiquetas,” which is broadcast on the most popular radio station in the city of Cuenca. The program has given visibility and voice to local LGBTQ people, providing a safe space for the discussion of important issues, events, challenges, and achievements within the community.

Social media is another infrastructure that has allowed us to conduct this research. It provides a public forum and downloadable data that we as researchers can analyze to measure public sentiment on current issues.

RapidMinder is a data science software that we have used to construct the algorithm to conduct the analysis.