Digital literacy as a household-based social practice: women operating rural homestays in Bali

Digital technologies are increasingly important in tourism, yet digital literacy is often understood primarily as an individual technical competence. This study examines how digital literacy among women operating rural homestays in Bali is enacted as a household-based social practice embedded in domestic and tourism work. Using a qualitative approach, data were collected through semi-structured interviews, field observations, and documentary materials involving 16 informants in Desa Sayan, Ubud. Findings show that digital literacy develops mainly through experiential learning and everyday interactions rather than formal training. Digital practices are selectively incorporated into household routines and homestay operations, strengthening women’s operational agency while remaining shaped by domestic responsibilities, gendered labour, and household decision-making structures. The study conceptualises digitalisation in household-based tourism as domestically organised, gendered, and relational, showing how digital labour becomes intertwined with productive, reproductive, and tourism work and contributes to the continuity and inclusiveness of small-scale household tourism.