{"title":"Queering the ‘resourcing’ of LGBTQ+ young people in the Asia Pacific","authors":"Niki Cheong, Amelia Johns, P. Byron","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2023.2249970","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2249970","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Scholars have long been critical of development agendas where Global North organisations develop aid programmes and resources to address inequalities in the Global South, which tend to reflect Western values, frameworks, and identity. Critical response can be seen in current calls for decolonising the ‘resourcing’ of LGBTQ+ young people in the Global South. Drawing from the postcolonial lenses of ‘Asia as Method’ and a reorienting of that paradigm through ‘queer Asia as method’, we argue for ‘queering’ approaches to digitally resourcing LGBTQ+ young people in the region by centring the knowledge of local communities. This paper is informed by findings from two research projects involving digital resources on young people’s digital citizenship, safety, literacy and participation, and the lived experiences of respondents from 10 countries across the Asia Pacific.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"1 1","pages":"2439 - 2456"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83233002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Leveraging digital methods in the quest for peaceful futures: the interplay of sincere and subjunctive technology affordances in peace mediation","authors":"Andreas T. Hirblinger, Ville Brummer, Felix Kufus","doi":"10.1080/1369118x.2023.2247070","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118x.2023.2247070","url":null,"abstract":"Efforts to support the resolution of armed conflicts through the facilitation of peace negotiations and dialogues increasingly involve digital technologies. While traditionally perceived as a human-centered activity, peace mediation now commonly entails information- and data-driven methods to enhance talks, support the analysis of conflict stakeholder needs and interests, and ground mediation efforts in better evidence. Digital technologies also promise to make peace efforts more future-oriented by helping to predict or anticipate upcoming developments, build scenarios, and increase readiness for emerging challenges. However, little is known about how such methods can be employed in dialogue and negotiation settings, where participants may have subjective and incompatible views on the conflict context, and more data and evidence don’t necessarily help to determine what a more peaceful future could look like. Through a qualitative study of the use of digitally enhanced dialogue efforts in Yemen and Libya, we demonstrate that future-oriented peacemaking requires the balancing of ‘sincere’ technology affordances that encourage an engagement with the past and present reality of conflict, with ‘subjunctive’ technology affordances that encourage an engagement with possible futures that are more peaceful. In practice, this requires combining data- and evidence-generating methods concerned with the world ‘as is’ with data analysis and visualization methods concerned with how the world ‘should’ or ‘could’ be. Our findings have implications for the study of digital methods in the facilitation of contentious political processes where the provision of data and evidence may create hurting deadlocks.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-08-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135876788","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Examining the cultural dimension of contact-tracing app adoption during the COVID-19 pandemic: a cross-country study in Singapore and Switzerland","authors":"Sarah Geber, S. Ho","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2082880","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2082880","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Contact-tracing applications (CTAs) have been introduced as part of the COVID-19 containment strategy worldwide. In most countries, however, their uptake has been too low to realize their full potential. This study contributes to the understanding of CTA adoption by investigating the influence of public perceptions on adoption and the role of media in forming these perceptions in Singapore and Switzerland. In a comparative approach, online surveys in both countries (Singapore: N = 998; Switzerland: N = 1,022) and multigroup structural equation modeling reveal national differences. First, attention to media was associated more strongly with app-related perceptions in Singapore than in Switzerland, with news media attention correlating positively with favorable perceptions in both countries (i.e., perceived usefulness of the CTA, perceived social norms of adoption) and social media attention correlating negatively with these perceptions in Singapore. Second, regarding the influence of these perceptions on CTA adoption, perceived usefulness was associated with CTA adoption in Switzerland but not in Singapore; conversely, perceived social norms were more important in Singapore than in Switzerland. These results suggest that the communicative formation of public perceptions and their behavioral relevance are contingent on media systems (authoritarian vs. democratic media system) and cultural values (collectivism vs. individualism), highlighting the theoretical value of a country-comparative approach and the practical need for a culturally sensitive implementation of health technologies.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"2229 - 2249"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-08-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47223423","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
I. Gagliardone, Matti Pohjonen, S. Diepeveen, Samuel Olaniran
{"title":"Clones and zombies: rethinking conspiracy theories and the digital public sphere through a (post)-colonial perspective","authors":"I. Gagliardone, Matti Pohjonen, S. Diepeveen, Samuel Olaniran","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2023.2239890","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2239890","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article investigates what is at stake in decolonising the study of conspiracy theories online. It challenges the confidence with which conspiracy theories are often dismissed as aberrations and negative externalities of digital ecosystems. Without reifying conspiracy theories, we identify as problematic how alternative forms of knowledge production are dismissed and colonial tropes reproduced. Contributing to conversations around ‘decolonising the internet’, we offer additional and sharper tools to understand the role and implications of conspiracy theorising for communicative and political practices in different societies globally. Empirically, we analyse a conspiracy theory circulating in Nigeria between 2018 and 2019 purporting that Nigerian President Buhari had died and the man in office was his ‘clone’. Conceptually, our analysis intersects with Achille Mbembe’s work on power in the postcolony, to illustrate how it is possible to adopt alternative forms of normativity that eschew the stigmatisation and exclusion that has prevailed, but still offer evaluative frameworks to locate conspiracy theories in contemporary digital environments. We engage with Mbembe’s ideas about how humorous and grotesque forms of communication can result in the zombification of both the ‘dominant’ and those ‘apparently dominated’. We argue that zombification as a theoretical intervention provides a useful addition to the conceptual and normative repertoire of those studying conspiracy theories, between the poles of dismissal/condemnation and pure curiosity/acceptance of what is said.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"2419 - 2438"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-08-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85199900","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Amber Marshall, Kim Osman, Jessa Rogers, Thu Pham, H. Babacan
{"title":"Connecting in the Gulf: exploring digital inclusion for Indigenous families on Mornington Island","authors":"Amber Marshall, Kim Osman, Jessa Rogers, Thu Pham, H. Babacan","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2023.2230262","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2230262","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Digital inclusion research explores the complex inequalities among different societal groups that affect people’s ability to fully participate in social, economic, and cultural life. Globally, digital inequalities exist between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people and this paper contributes to a growing body of literature focused on Indigenous digital inclusion in Australia. This paper outlines how a team of Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers developed an Indigenous research methodology to investigate the digital inclusion challenges, and opportunities, for Aboriginal families living in a remote community on Mornington Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria. This methodology applies principles of decolonisation, through Indigenous yarning and photography, to foreground the voices of Indigenous people in articulating barriers and solutions to low levels of digital inclusion in their community. The findings detail the everyday and novel ways Indigenous families use the internet and digital devices, and how these insights might inform Indigenous-focused policy, practices and programs.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"31 1","pages":"2376 - 2397"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-07-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86099442","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Digital Working Lives: Worker Autonomy and the Gig Economy","authors":"Guanqin He","doi":"10.1080/1369118x.2023.2227687","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118x.2023.2227687","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136355347","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Memecry: tracing the repetition-with-variation of formulas on 4chan/pol/","authors":"Sal Hagen, Tommaso Venturini","doi":"10.1080/1369118x.2023.2216769","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118x.2023.2216769","url":null,"abstract":"In this article we propose a new theoretical framework to conceptualise Internet memes and to trace their temporal variation on 4chan/pol/. We draw from literature on primary and secondary orality to conceptualise the repetition-with-variation of Internet memes as a form of memecry, which we argue is specifically pertinent to the collectivity of online subcultures. We operationalise its study through formulas: mnemonic phrases that encapsulate important elements of oral cultures, which have arguably regained prominence in ephemeral and fast-paced online environments. While Internet memes have often been studied as single images or words, formulas provide a more complex unit for tracing variation and not only circulation. We offer a quali-quantitative protocol to investigate memecry and visualise the spread and variability of 65 prominent formulas on 4chan/pol/, a far-right space known for its reliance on memes. By discussing several cases, we demonstrate how 4chan’s collective identity indeed features typical of secondary oral cultures, while revealing how the memecry of its formulas is entwined with reactionary sentiments and a subcultural struggle for distinction.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"9 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135996327","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
D. Kidd, Timothy Recuber, Matthew N. Atwell, Tyler Burgese, Andrew Chelius, Jaggar DeMarco, Dana Gallant, Benjamin Guidry, Glen Hartenbaum, C. Joyce, Ye Ju Ki, Kyle McDonald, Lindsay Metzker, Julia Scheffler, Victoria Vazquez, J. Walsh, FengYi Yin
{"title":"Beyond myopia in communications and the sociology of media","authors":"D. Kidd, Timothy Recuber, Matthew N. Atwell, Tyler Burgese, Andrew Chelius, Jaggar DeMarco, Dana Gallant, Benjamin Guidry, Glen Hartenbaum, C. Joyce, Ye Ju Ki, Kyle McDonald, Lindsay Metzker, Julia Scheffler, Victoria Vazquez, J. Walsh, FengYi Yin","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2023.2195902","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2195902","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This special issue of Information, Communication, and Society (ICS) is edited by the Communication, Information Technologies, and Media Sociology (CITAMS) section of the American Sociological Association and includes papers that were first presented at either the 2021 or 2022 ASA meetings or Media Sociology Symposia. For this special issue, an innovative editorial approach was taken that brought the editing process into a graduate classroom. That process is described below along with a brief introduction to themes of the selected articles. Key themes for this special issue include content analysis, ethics, privacy, new economy, and digital inequality.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"877 - 880"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-04-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46254218","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Critical discourse analysis guided topic modeling: the case of Al-Jazeera Arabic","authors":"Toni Rouhana","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2023.2166364","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2166364","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper analyzes all the articles and corresponding comments of Al-Jazeera Arabic's coverage of the Syrian war from 2011 to 2017. I propose a multilayered Critical Discourse Analysis Guided Topic Modeling method that includes context of social structures and processes in the analysis of topics. This article shows that the employment of topic modeling without Critical Discourse Analysis does not unravel the power relations embedded within the platform. Two different applications of this method are used to demonstrate how a guided topic modeling method can lead to more nuanced results that can unravel important social dynamics which would have remained unperceived if applying traditional computational methods.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"904 - 922"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-02-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41740362","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Stepping into Visibility Model: reflecting on consequences of social media visibility – a Global South perspective","authors":"I. Rega, A. Medrado","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2021.1954228","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2021.1954228","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article discusses activists’ need to reflect on how achieving social media visibility might translate into vulnerability. In order to provide activists with a tool for this reflection, the Stepping into Visibility Model has been developed and applied to two case studies: (a) an activist group in a Brazilian favela using social media for protection against police brutality and (b) a Kenyan photographer, affiliated to an art-ivist (artistic and activist) collective, producing images of Nairobi at night to tackle social anxiety issues. The research draws from sociological insights on the concept of ‘visibility’ and adopts a case study methodology combined with ethnographic approaches. By adopting a Global South perspective, it discusses counter surveillance efforts in ways that go beyond techno-legal solutionism (Dencik et al, 2016) and in periods outside that of big-scale protests (McCosker, 2015). By devising this model, we hope to offer a contribution on how marginalised communities can be better informed when they encounter unintended negative visibility.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"405 - 424"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2023-01-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43036224","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}