About COVIMADI

What is digital gender-based violence?

Digital gender-based violence is one of the most serious and complex social issues of the present. It affects women, LGBTQI+ people, and young people with particular intensity, and includes practices such as online harassment, digital surveillance and control, non-consensual sharing of intimate images, hate speech, identity manipulation, and smear campaigns.

Although these forms of violence unfold in virtual environments, their consequences are profoundly material. They shape mental health, public participation, educational and labour trajectories, and the sense of safety of the people affected.

Premises and goals

COVIMADI emerged as a teaching innovation project deployed across university settings that understands the university as a space capable of going beyond the transmission of knowledge. In this framework, the classroom is conceived as a place from which to generate critical awareness and promote responses to social and gender-related issues.

In its first phase, the project aimed for university students to acquire a solid understanding of DGBV from a sociological and feminist perspective, recognise its different forms, and develop concrete proposals to confront it.

Working methodology

COVIMADI combined Problem-Based Learning and Project-Based Learning, and in some cases added Service-Learning. The work started from real cases of DGBV to analyse causes, involved actors, consequences, and socio-political contexts, and then moved towards the design of concrete interventions.

The development of each project relied on Design Thinking and Hackathon methodologies. The process included initial training on DGBV and on the working methodology, the choice of the form of violence to address, research into concepts, practices, and existing responses, the phase of empathy and problem definition, solution ideation, prototyping, testing, and final presentation.

In some cases, this path was completed with Service-Learning experiences in which students presented the form of violence they had worked on and the results of their projects in talks or workshops aimed at secondary-school students.

First implementation phase

The paper analyses the first phase developed in two Sociology courses, one undergraduate and one master’s level. The analysis focused on 17 final projects and on the materials produced during the process, such as presentations, videos, campaigns, and guides.

Preliminary findings

The projects developed by students addressed diverse forms of DGBV, including gendered digital harassment, sextortion, deepfakes, gaslighting, mansplaining, online control and surveillance, slutshaming, and lgtbqshaming. Among the most recurrent topics were sexually based digital violence and several forms of symbolic violence.

The proposed responses were also heterogeneous. They included action protocols, guides, flyers, awareness-raising social media accounts, board games, quizzes, talks, and interactive activities. Online-oriented formats had particular weight, as did concise outreach materials such as infographics and guides.

Scope and limits

Among the strengths identified, the analysis highlights the attention paid to viability and to the possible replicability of the proposals in school and institutional settings. It also underlines the use of inclusive language, non-discriminatory iconography, support resources adapted to different situations, and a clear intention to produce accessible materials.

At the same time, the first phase showed clear limits. The available time conditioned both the development and the presentation of several projects, and some proposals centred on social media were constrained by their reach. In addition, although the gender perspective was present throughout, the intersectional perspective appeared with less consistency.

Conclusion

Overall, this first phase points to the potential of teaching innovation methodologies to generate responses to digital gender-based violence from a feminist perspective. The analysis shows that the classroom can become a space from which to produce creative, applied proposals oriented towards confronting these forms of violence.