Coloring the Communication Currents
A reflection on our first spring speaker- TJ Billard (and plenty of CITAP news and events).
TJ Billard | Book Talk | Highlights & Reflection!
TJ Billard, Assistant Professor in the School of Communication at Northwestern University, joined us on Thursday, February 8th for a full day of meeting with CITAP faculty, students, and of course- their book talk! TJ’s book, “Voices for Transgender Equality: Making Change in the Networked Public Sphere”, “makes a compelling case of what it takes to make social and political change in a world transformed by digital media” (Oxford University Press)
Billard introduced and discussed the concept of the "politics of flows", saying that “this kind of activism is focused less on effecting individual media types, media narratives, or media producers, and more on transforming how information flows throughout the communication system, shifting the locus of action away from targets towards processes.”
Using a quick metaphor, TJ was able to explain politics of flows in a visually impactful way. The politics of flows includes the different spheres of the communication system: mass media, local and community media, and social networks. TJ discussed how they live in Chicago, and every St. Patrick’s Day, the city dyes the Chicago River green. As the water flows in from Lake Michigan, though, that dye becomes diluted and continues down the stream to the Des Plaines River.
Many think of activism like dye in different areas of their life: drop a little activism on a social network site, and that message will flow to the rest. But, the activism gets diluted- medium to medium, platform to platform- and won’t travel fully or undiluted to the different spheres. If, however, activists participate across all spheres, “that colored water circulates from domain to domain where it can be seen by all, and if you adequately understand the currents that are flowing in that system, you can be strategic about when and where you drop that dye to maximize its circulation.”
“Whereas activists of an earlier era could quite easily fight for representation on for broadcast television networks and a handful of national newspapers with confidence that success meant that your issues are being experienced by the vast majority of the population, activists today don't have those same assurances… Social media are largely considered to be the media of activism, the media through which movements organize themselves, represent themselves to the public, and make claims on the state and other institutions that are invested with social, cultural, economic and political power. But the transgender movement isn't a hashtag movement, and it isn't a networked protest movement, and it isn't even a digitally enabled movement: it is very much an old school, classic social movement in every sense, that just happens to be native to the digital environment- and the same is true of a lot of the most important social movements today.”
If you missed the talk, and want to check out the recording (including the Q&A), you can do so here 👇👇👇
“All I’m offering is the truth”
CITAP principal investigator, Alice Marwick, and CITAP GRA and PhD candidate, Katherine Furl, investigate the connection between disinformation and online radicalization in “Mountains of Evidence: Processual “Redpilling” as a Sociotechnical Effect of Disinformation” (International Journal of Communication).
In looking into Reddit, Gab, and Discord redpill posts, the authors discovered 2 different narratives of redpilling:
Redpill as a moment of conversion
Redpill as Process
“It is through consuming redpills that the subject sees the hidden truth and wakes up to the reality of a world turned against them. However, by repeating the term “redpill,” participants and critics alike position this evidence as so convincing that it can convert people instantly. The reality—that adopting extremist beliefs is a longer process of socialization imbricated with community ties and networks—is less dramatic, but offers more potential for intervention.”
Processual redpilling, and its connection with “facts” and “evidence” as “proof”, “demonstrates the inextricable link between extremism and disinformation”. The implications of this, then, are:
Attending solely to disinformation spread on sites like Twitter or YouTube ignores how pervasive disinformation is across the Internet.
Academics or other knowledge-producers working in disciplines where their research can easily be misused have a public responsibility to recognize the potential for such interpretation and work assiduously to counter it.
Attempts to work against “online radicalization” must explicitly address the role of science and rationality in the process of taking on extremist beliefs and create counter-messaging that appeals to these values.
Publications and appearances
The 2024 Knight Informed Conference took place from January 22nd-24th, where the Knight Foundation gathers members of the Knight Research Network & experts across the academy, government, industry and civil society to discuss and debate “the most significant issues at the crossroads of technology, media, and democracy.”
Tressie McMillan Cottom participated in an engaging Fireside Chat on Tuesday the 23rd with danah boyd and Janet Vertesi- if you would like to watch the recording, you can do so here!
Coming soon
March
March 20th @ 12pm in the Freedom Forum conference Center: UNC Sociology and CITAP are co-hosting speaker, Forrest Stuart. Lunch will be provided! More details to come.
April
April 12th in the Freedom Forum Conference Center: CITAP will be hosting an event in celebration and reflection of the launch of the book “Media and January 6th” Save the date and stay tuned for more details!