Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) systems are increasingly deployed in web-based educational environments, yet transparency can be seen as a primarily ethical, and, too often, optional, concern, rather than foundational. This paper presents design patterns for building transparent RAG systems, derived from developing and deploying SAGE-RAI, an advanced multi-purpose RAG system, in an educational context. Through systematic evaluation combining quantitative rating data (n=26, mean rating=4.62/5) and qualitative interviews (n=4), we demonstrate that transparency serves dual pedagogical and ethical functions. Our empirical findings reveal high user satisfaction (92.3% rating 4-5 stars) while identifying critical tensions between AI assistance and learning independence. Our findings suggest that as RAG systems increasingly mediate access to web-based knowledge, transparency must evolve from an optional feature to an architectural requirement.

Social Networking Sites are home to different forms of hate, including "Misogynoir", which specifically targets Black women through a combination of racism and sexism. Detecting misogynoir presents challenges due to its subjective nature and the varied interpretations of hate speech. Using annotator justifications from four distinct demographic groups; including Black women, Black men, White women and White men, we seek to gain a deeper understanding of the factors that influence annotators' reasoning process and labelling decisions for potential cases of Misogynoir and Allyship. Given the unique experiences of Black women who face both racism and sexism, the study sought to understand how their intersectional identities shape their perspectives compared to other groups. The research employed a qualitative analysis of responses from participants to identify key themes and patterns. Three significant themes emerged from our in-depth qualitative analysis of these annotator justifications: prior knowledge and experience, the language of the social media post, and its context. Our results revealed that annotators historically at risk of abuse demonstrated a nuanced understanding of how their intersecting identities inform their interpretations and judgement of tweets, drawing on their personal encounters with misogyny and racism compared to their non-target counterparts of this type of hate. This study underscores the significance of diverse annotator perspectives and content comprehension in understanding and addressing hate speech, particularly when it intersects with multiple forms of discrimination. Our study contributes to the methodological advancements in social network analysis and mining, highlighting the importance of considering annotator characteristics in the development of tools and approaches for detecting and addressing intersectional hate.

Hate speech detection systems may exhibit discriminatory behaviours. Research in this field has focused primarily on issues of discrimination toward the language use of minoritised communities and non-White aligned English. The interrelated issues of bias, model robustness, and disproportionate harms are weakly addressed by recent evaluation approaches, which capture them only implicitly. In this paper, we recruit a multidisciplinary group of experts to bring closer this divide between fairness and trustworthy model evaluation. Specifically, we encourage the experts to discuss not only the technical, but the social, ethical, and legal aspects of this timely issue. The discussion sheds light on critical bias facets that require careful considerations when deploying hate speech detection systems in society. Crucially, they bring clarity to different approaches for assessing, becoming aware of bias from a broader perspective, and offer valuable recommendations for future research in this field.

"Misogynoir" refers to the specific forms of misogyny that Black women experience, which couple racism and sexism together. To better understand the online manifestations of this type of hate, and to propose methods that can automatically identify it, in this paper, we conduct a study on 4 cases of Black women in Tech reporting experiences of misogynoir on the Twitter platform. We follow the reactions to these cases (both supportive and non-supportive responses), and categorise them within a model of misogynoir that highlights experiences of Tone Policing, White Centring, Racial Gaslighting and Defensiveness. As an intersectional form of abusive or hateful speech, we investigate the possibilities and challenges to detect online instances of misogynoir in an automated way. We then conduct a closer qualitative analysis on messages of support and non-support to look at some of these categories in more detail. The purpose of this investigation is to understand responses to misogynoir online, including doubling down on misogynoir, engaging in performative allyship, and showing solidarity with Black women in tech.