| 1. |
- Ask, Kristine, et al.
(författare)
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My life is a mess : self-deprecating relatability and collective identities in the memification of student issues
- 2018
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : Routledge. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 21:6, s. 834-850
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this paper, we investigate memes about student issues. We consider the memes as expressions of a new networked student public that contain discourses that may fall outside the mainstream discourse on higher education. The paper is based on content analysis of 179 posts in the public Facebook Group ‘Student Problem Memes’, combined with a nine-month media watch and a discussion workshop with 15 students. Through self-deprecating humour, students create an inverse attention economy of competitive one-downmanship, where the goal is to display humorous failure instead of perfect appearance. Our analysis shows that students use humour to express, share, and commiserate over daily struggles, but also that the problems related to work/study balance and mental health, are experienced as a persistent feature of student living. We also analyse limitations of meme-based publics, emphasizing processes of inclusion and exclusion through specific vernaculars of visual and discursive humour where issues related to gender, race, orientation, class, and ability are sidelined in favour of relatable humour.
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| 2. |
- Askanius, Tina, 1978-, et al.
(författare)
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Murder fantasies in memes : fascist aesthetics of death threats and the banalization of white supremacist violence
- 2021
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : Taylor & Francis. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 24:16, s. 2522-2539
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper traces the recent turn to humour, irony and ambiguity embodied in the adaptation of memes into the repertoire of online propaganda of the militant neo-Nazi group the Nordic Resistance Movement; in a process, we dub the ‘memefication’ of white supremacism. Drawing on a combination of quantitative visual content analysis (VCA) and in-depth visual analysis focused on iconography and symbolism, we explore all memes (N = 634) created and circulated by the group around the 2018 general elections in the country. The analysis proceeds in two steps: First, we present the results of the VCA in which we identified five thematic categories of memes crafting white supremacy, xenophobia, homophobia, misogyny and anti-Semitic ideas onto esoteric and popular culture iconography then to map these across a matrix of content and form. We then proceed to the analysis of the cluster of memes coded as violent to explore the iconography and symbolism used to promote violence and death threats and render them banal. We draw on a range of recent scholarship on the entanglement of memes in the rise of the far- right and engage critical perspectives on the necropower of fascism to explore the interplay between ambiguous, playful and jokey imagery on the one hand and the murder fantasies and serious threat of white supremacist violence at the heart of neo- Nazi ideology, on the other.
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| 3. |
- Avlona, Natalia-Rozalia, et al.
(författare)
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Torquing patients into data: enactments of care about, for and through medical data in algorithmic systems
- 2024
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The increasing digitisation of healthcare services has transformed healthcare provision into a data-centric enterprise. Thinking with Joan Tronto and her notion of care, we study medical data practices in the context of a health-tech company developing an algorithmically driven platform to match patients and their physicians with clinical trials. What does it mean to pose the patient in the centre in such a context? In this paper, we show how the enactments of patient-centrism translate to multidimensional enactments of data care for a diversity of domain experts handling medical data, informed by the values and backgrounds of each 'data handler' situated within the concerns of their domain expertise. Where data experts engage solely with the patients' data to facilitate data creation for the platform's algorithmic system, the quest for data quality depends on the preceding practices of care and affective labour about and for the patients. We show how patients get help to torque their medical records and histories into data to fit the demands of the system to ensure access to experimental treatments and clinical trials. We demonstrate how patient-centrism manifests as care for data quality, shaped throughout by differentiated concerns for regulatory compliance. Finally, we argue that regulatory compliance constitutes a care practice across data work that is diversified in its enactments by the experts' domain concerns and backgrounds.
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| 4. |
- Bellander, Theres, 1977-, et al.
(författare)
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Becoming the expert constructing health knowledge in epistemic communities online
- 2020
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : Routledge. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 23:4, s. 507-522
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- From a discourse analytic framework, the article analyses health blogs and patient’s forum discussions in which parents to children with congenital heart defects recontextualize medical professional knowledge and share their own experiences. The study show how the two types of online media may serve as a means for parents to attain expert status in their own case by sharing lay knowledge expressed as an amalgamation of the two key perspectives – professional and experienced – as an indivisible unit. Monological discourses, such as narrating, in blogs and more direct and immediate responses in forum discussions are noted as examples of differences in how medical facts are explained and negotiated, how advice is provided and how patient expertise is created. The study also show how blogs and especially forum discussions are used to problematize the validity of actions and opinions of medical staff. The role of developing patient expertise in epistemic communities online may therefore come with a risk of spreading misrepresentation of medical cases.
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| 5. |
- Bennett, W. Lance, et al.
(författare)
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Digital Media and the Personalization of Collective Action : Social technology and the organization of protests against the global economic crisis
- 2011
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 14:6, s. 770-799
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Changes related to globalization have resulted in the growing separation of individuals in late modern societies from traditional bases of social solidarity such as parties, churches, and other mass organizations. One sign of this growing individualization is the organization of individual action in terms of meanings assigned to lifestyle elements resulting in the personalization of issues such as climate change, labour standards, and the quality of food supplies. Such developments bring individuals' own narratives to the fore in the mobilization process, often requiring organizations to be more flexible in their definitions of issues. This personalization of political action presents organizations with a set of fundamental challenges involving potential trade-offs between flexibility and effectiveness. This paper analyses how different protest networks used digital media to engage individuals in mobilizations targeting the 2009 G20 London Summit during the global financial crisis. The authors examine how these different communication processes affected the political capacity of the respective organizations and networked coalitions. In particular, the authors explore whether the coalition offering looser affiliation options for individuals displays any notable loss of public engagement, policy focus (including mass media impact), or solidarity network coherence. This paper also examines whether the coalition offering more rigid collective action framing and fewer personalized social media affordances displays any evident gain in the same dimensions of mobilization capacity. In this case, the evidence suggests that the more personalized collective action process maintains high levels of engagement, agenda focus, and network strength.
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| 6. |
- Bennett, W. Lance, et al.
(författare)
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Organization in the crowd : peer production in large-scale networked protests
- 2014
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 17:2, s. 232-260
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- How is crowd organization produced? How are crowd-enabled networks activated, structured, and maintained in the absence of recognized leaders, common goals, or conventional organization, issue framing, and action coordination? We develop an analytical framework for examining the organizational processes of crowd-enabled connective action such as was found in the Arab Spring, the 15-M in Spain, and Occupy Wall Street. The analysis points to three elemental modes of peer production that operate together to create organization in crowds: the production, curation, and dynamic integration of various types of information content and other resources that become distributed and utilized across the crowd. Whereas other peer-production communities such as open-source software developers or Wikipedia typically evolve more highly structured participation environments, crowds create organization through packaging these elemental peer-production mechanisms to achieve various kinds of work. The workings of these production packages' are illustrated with a theory-driven analysis of Twitter data from the 2011-2012 US Occupy movement, using an archive of some 60 million tweets. This analysis shows how the Occupy crowd produced various organizational routines, and how the different production mechanisms were nested in each other to create relatively complex organizational results.
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| 7. |
- Bennett, W. Lance, et al.
(författare)
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The democratic interface : technology, political organization, and diverging patterns of electoral representation
- 2018
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 21:11, s. 1655-1680
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Democracies are experiencing historic disruptions affecting how people engage with core institutions such as the press, civil society organizations, parties, and elections. These processes of citizen interaction with institutions operate as a democratic interface shaping self-government and the quality of public life. The electoral dimension of the interface is important, as its operation can affect all others. This analysis explores a growing left-right imbalance in the electoral connection between citizens, parties, elections, and government. This imbalance is due, in part, to divergent left-right preferences for political engagement, organization, and communication. Support on the right for clearer social rules and simpler moral, racial and nationalist agendas are compatible with hierarchical, leader-centered party organizations that compete more effectively in elections. Parties on the left currently face greater challenges engaging citizens due to the popular meta-ideology of diversity and inclusiveness and demands for direct or deliberative democracy. What we term connective parties are developing technologies to perform core organizational functions, and some have achieved electoral success. However, when connective parties on the left try to develop shared authority processes, online and offline, they face significant challenges competing with more conventionally organized parties on the right.
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| 8. |
- Bennett, W. Lance, et al.
(författare)
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The logic of connective action : Digital media and the personalization of contentious politics
- 2012
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 15:5, s. 739-768
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- From the Arab Spring and los indignados in Spain, to Occupy Wall Street (and beyond), large-scale, sustained protests are using digital media in ways that go beyond sending and receiving messages. Some of these action formations contain relatively small roles for formal brick and mortar organizations. Others involve well-established advocacy organizations, in hybrid relations with other organizations, using technologies that enable personalized public engagement. Both stand in contrast to the more familiar organizationally managed and brokered action conventionally associated with social movement and issue advocacy. This article examines the organizational dynamics that emerge when communication becomes a prominent part of organizational structure. It argues that understanding such variations in large-scale action networks requires distinguishing between at least two logics that may be in play: The familiar logic of collective action associated with high levels of organizational resources and the formation of collective identities, and the less familiar logic of connective action based on personalized content sharing across media networks. In the former, introducing digital media do not change the core dynamics of the action. In the case of the latter, they do. Building on these distinctions, the article presents three ideal types of large-scale action networks that are becoming prominent in the contentious politics of the contemporary era.
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| 9. |
- Bichler, Robert M., et al.
(författare)
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Sustainable development and ICTs
- 2010
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 13:1, s. 1-5
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)
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| 10. |
- Bolin, Göran, 1959-
(författare)
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The Labour of Media Use : The Two Active Audiences
- 2012
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Ingår i: Information, Communication and Society. - : Routledge. - 1369-118X .- 1468-4462. ; 15:6, s. 796-814
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The ‘active audience’ has theoretically been conceptualized from two perspectives: in political economy, it is suggested that television audiences work for the networks while watching and that they contribute to the valorization process with their labour. Although contested, it has survived among media scholars, also feeding into the discussion on web surveillance techniques. The other conceptualization comes from reception theory, media ethnography and cultural studies, where the interpretive work by audiences is seen as productive and resulting in identities, taste cultures and social difference. This article relates these perspectives by considering audiences as involved in two production–consumptions circuits: (1) the viewer activities produce social difference (identities and cultural meaning) in a social and cultural economy, which is then (2) made the object of productive consumption as part of the activities of the media industries, the end product being economic profit.This article argues for the relevance of analysing these as separate circuits, with different kinds of labour at their centre, and that recent debates on the active audience often misrecognize the difference.
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