Building inclusive AI ecosystems by expanding African language datasets and centering community-led digital rights.
Zimbabwean digital policy leader and feminist researcher Chenai Chair has spent over a decade demystifying technology and unpacking digital power dynamics. With more than 2,000 African languages largely absent from today’s AI models, millions of people risk being cut off from life-changing knowledge and opportunities.
As Director of the Masakhane African Languages Hub— a name meaning ” we build together”—Chenai leads a continent-wide movement building open-source AI datasets. Uniting linguists, sociologists, and local communities, the Hub creates language data from the ground up, enabling AI models to operate in everyday spoken languages.
Chenai advocates for a human-centered equity vision where language inclusion, gender equity, and local capacity are embedded directly into technology design, rather than treated as secondary considerations. Driven by the power of collective action, she ensures African communities participate as creators and decision-makers, keeping AI grounded in local agency and shared dignity.