scholarly journals Text–Image Relationships in Tweets: Shaping the Meanings of an Epidemic

Societies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Celine Morin ◽  
Arnaud Mercier ◽  
Laetitia Atlani-Duault
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Public Sphere ◽  
Sexual Transmission ◽  
Comprehensive Approach ◽  
Humanitarian Crisis ◽  
Humanitarian Crises ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Way

1. Background: While many studies analyze the functions that images can fulfill during humanitarian crises or catastrophes, an understanding of how meaning is constructed in text–image relationships is lacking. This article explores how discourses are produced using different types of text–image interactions. It presents a case study focusing on a humanitarian crisis, more specifically the sexual transmission of Ebola. 2. Methods: Data were processed both quantitatively and qualitatively through a keyword-based selection. Tweets containing an image were retrieved from a database of 210,600 tweets containing the words “Ebola” and “semen”, in English and in French, over the course of 12 months. When this first selection was crossed with the imperative of focusing on a specific thematic (the sexual transmission of Ebola) and avoiding off-topic text–image relationships, it led to reducing the corpus to 182 tweets. 3. Results: The article proposes a four-category classification of text–image relationships. Theoretically, it provides original insights into how discourses are built in social media; it also highlights the semiotic significance of images in expressing an opinion or an emotion. 4. Conclusion: The results suggest that the process of signification needs to be rethought: Content enhancement and dialogism through images have a bearing on Twitter’s use as a public sphere, such as credibilization of discourses or politicization of events. This opens the way to a new, more comprehensive approach to the rhetorics of users on Twitter.

scholarly journals Coronajerga, covidioma, coronalengua: acerca de los cambios lingüísticos en tiempos de la pandemia

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Gwiazdowska
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Formation Process ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Word Formation ◽  
Formation Mechanisms ◽  
Lexical Borrowing ◽  
Base Form ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Way

The aim of this paper is to present how the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has changed our language and the way we communicate. The article focuses on the recent Spanish neologisms that have appeared during the pandemic year 2020 and attempts to analyze their word-formation process. The theoretical framework of this study is based on the classification of neologisms proposed by M.T. Cabré Castellví (2006). Firstly, the paper highlights semantic innovations, that is, neologisms which are formed through broadening, narrowing or change of the meaning of the base form. Secondly, different types of word formation mechanisms, such as affixations, compounding, conversion or shortening are discussed. The paper also gives new insights into the most creative ways that vocabulary related to coronavirus (COVID-19) has expanded (lexical borrowing, wordplay). The data were collected from articles, books, dictionaries, social media and various websites.

‘Eww wtf, what a dumb bitch’: a case study of similitudes inside gender-specific swearing patterns on Twitter

Corpora ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-61
Author(s):  
Michael Gauthier
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Everyday Lives ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Gender Specific ◽  
The Way

Contrary to the idea which has been widespread for at least a hundred years that women differ substantially from men when they express themselves in English-speaking contexts (e.g., Jespersen, 1922 ; and Steadman, 1935 ), empirical studies have shown that these differences are often minimal and are not due to gender alone (e.g., Eckert, 2008 ; and Baker, 2014 ). This also frequently applies to the way they swear, despite certain preferences which have been documented in empirical studies. With the growing impact that social media now has in our everyday lives, these represent a unique opportunity to study vast quantities of written data. This paper is based on a corpus of about one-million tweets and is an attempt to delve deeper into the analysis of gendered swearword habits. First, the goal is to show that even if there are certain gendered preferences in terms of the choice of swearwords, women and men frequently display similar patterns in using them, thus reinforcing the idea that they are not so linguistically different. Secondly, this paper provides insights into how collocational networks can be used to achieve this, and thus how focussing on differences can be one way to spot similarities across two sub-corpora.

The Neuroscience of Social Television

2018 ◽  
pp. 439-452
Author(s):  
Shaun A Seixas ◽  
Geoffrey E Nield ◽  
Peter Pynta ◽  
Richard B Silberstein
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Opposite Effect ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Consumer Engagement ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
The Way

In a short few years, social media has become the dominant way in which we communicate with the outside world. It has become prevalent in almost every aspect of our daily lives, but one of the most significant changes social media has had, has been on the way we watch television. This phenomenon, known as dual screening, has caused some concern amongst marketers and advertisers, who believed that this behaviour was having an overall negative impact on consumer engagement with television. This chapter attempts to address some of these concerns by providing evidence obtained from the neurosciences and from a case study. The evidence we present in this chapter demonstrates the opposite effect, whereby social media can actually be used to enhance viewer engagement.

False Information Narratives

2019 ◽  
pp. 326-348
Author(s):  
J. J. Sylvia IV ◽  
Kyle Moody
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Best Practices ◽  
Presidential Election ◽  
Internet Research ◽  
False Information ◽  
Media Campaigns ◽  
Geographic Locations ◽  
The U.S ◽  
The Way

The issue of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election has been widely debated by scholars and journalists. However, these works have not fully analyzed the ads that have been released by Facebook and the U.S. Congress. This project uses a case study to analyze the ads posted by the Russian-affiliated Internet Research Agency, considering the quantities of ads targeted to particular geographic locations, the frequency of targeting for unique keywords, and the reach and impressions of each of the ads. Further, these results are compared to results from best practices in traditional social media campaigns as a way to better understand the goals and potential impacts of the IRA ads. In conclusion, the project, by analyzing the full set of IRA ads, sheds new light on the way false information narratives were leveraged by the Russian-linked IRA.

Social Media as Alternative Public Sphere for Citizen Participation and Protest in National Politics in Zimbabwe

2018 ◽  
pp. 17-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Collen Sabao ◽  
Tendai Owen Chikara
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Public Sphere ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Politics ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
The Impact

The chapter examines and discusses the role and communicative potential of social media based platforms in citizen political participation and protests in Zimbabwe specifically focusing on the #thisflag movement on Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp. #thisflag is a social media-based platform that rose to challenge the Zimbabwean government over the political and economic decay as well as rampant corruption characterising the country contemporarily. While a new phenomenon to Zimbabwe and Zimbabwean politics, the impact and communicative potential of social media as an alternative public sphere was recently tested in nationwide protest stayaway organised through the Facebook and Twitter movement under the #thisflag handle/brand. This chapter discusses the manners in which such social media platforms impact national politics in Zimbabwe as well as globally, specifically looking at the #thisflag movement as a case study.

Social Media as Alternative Public Sphere for Citizen Participation and Protest in National Politics in Zimbabwe

2020 ◽  
pp. 772-786
Author(s):  
Collen Sabao ◽  
Tendai Owen Chikara
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Public Sphere ◽  
Citizen Participation ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Politics ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
The Impact

The chapter examines and discusses the role and communicative potential of social media based platforms in citizen political participation and protests in Zimbabwe specifically focusing on the #thisflag movement on Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp. #thisflag is a social media-based platform that rose to challenge the Zimbabwean government over the political and economic decay as well as rampant corruption characterising the country contemporarily. While a new phenomenon to Zimbabwe and Zimbabwean politics, the impact and communicative potential of social media as an alternative public sphere was recently tested in nationwide protest stayaway organised through the Facebook and Twitter movement under the #thisflag handle/brand. This chapter discusses the manners in which such social media platforms impact national politics in Zimbabwe as well as globally, specifically looking at the #thisflag movement as a case study.

Ambivalent Humanitarian Crises and Complex Emergencies

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dennis Dijkzeul ◽  
Diana Griesinger
Keyword(s):  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Crisis ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
Humanitarian Crises ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Local Actors ◽  
Definition Of

The term “humanitarian crisis” combines two words of controversial meaning and definitions that are often used in very different situations. For example, there is no official definition of “humanitarian crisis” in international humanitarian law. Although some academic disciplines have developed ways of collecting and analyzing data on (potential) crises, all of them have difficulties understanding, defining, and even identifying humanitarian crises. Following an overview of the use of the compound noun “humanitarian crisis,” three perspectives from respectively the disciplines International Humanitarian Law, Public Health, and Humanitarian Studies are discussed in order to explore their different but partly overlapping approaches to (incompletely) defining, representing, and negotiating humanitarian crises. These disciplinary perspectives often paint an incomplete and technocratic picture of crises that is rarely contextualized and, thus, fails to reflect adequately the political causes of crises and the roles of local actors. They center more on defining humanitarian action than on humanitarian crises. They also show four different types of humanitarian action, namely radical, traditional Dunantist, multimandate, and resilience humanitarianism. These humanitarianisms have different strengths and weaknesses in different types of crisis, but none comprehensively and successfully defines humanitarian crises. Finally, a multiperspective and power-sensitive definition of crises, and a more fine-grained language for comprehending the diversity of crises will do more justice to the complexity and longevity of crises and the persons who are surviving—or attempting to survive—them.

scholarly journals Researching intimacy through social media: A cross-platform approach

2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (60) ◽  
pp. 19
Author(s):  
Cristina Miguel
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Research Design ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Cross Platform ◽  
Media Interaction

This paper aims to contribute to the understanding of how to study the way people build intimacy and manage privacy through social media interaction. It explores the research design and methodology of a research project based on a multi-sited case study composed of three different social media platforms: Badoo, CouchSurfing, and Facebook. This cross-platform approach is useful to observe how intimacy is often negotiated across different platforms. The research project focuses on the cities of Leeds (UK) and Barcelona (Spain). In particular, this article discusses the methods used to recruit participants and collect data for that study - namely, participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and user profiles analysis. This cross-platform approach and multi-method research design is helpful to investigate the nature of intimacy practices facilitated by social media at several levels: online/offline, across different platforms, among different types of relationships, within both new and existing relationships, and in different locations

scholarly journals Mobile people, phones and photography: Somali visual practices in Nairobi's Eastleigh estate

Africa ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 225-245
Author(s):  
Neil Carrier
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Mobile Phone ◽  
East Africa ◽  
Government Policy ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Somali Diaspora ◽  
Mobile Phone Camera ◽  
The Way

AbstractThe coming of the mobile phone camera has transformed photography. This article explores this transformation through a case study of photography in Eastleigh, a Nairobi estate that is home to many thousand Somalis, both Kenyan Somalis and refugees from Somalia. It is a trade hub for East Africa, a social and economic hub for the global Somali diaspora, and a place regarded as suspect in a country where Somalis have long been marginalized. This article examines Eastleigh as photographic subject and setting, comparing the ubiquity of mobile phone photography there with seldom-practised more traditional forms of photography that are often treated with suspicion in an estate subject to securitized government policy and negative press. It shows how mobile phone photography helps people in the estate communicate visually with the wider Somali diaspora through social media, and how it helps people sell their goods, using as a case study a particular archive of images sent through WhatsApp to the author by Mohaa, a friend of his and a trader in the estate. The article also adds a political dimension to recent anthropological theorizing on mobile photography, showing how, in Eastleigh, Somalis have used photography and social media to take control of the way in which the estate is represented visually, and to demand from the state better services and better treatment.

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