11-23, 18:00–18:15 (Australia/Melbourne), Zoom Breakout Room 3
Social media platforms produce distinct units of observation that must be translated into our conventional units of analysis. For example, the alt-right is commonly qualified with inconsistent terminology as a social media phenomenon. Instead of imposing additional terminology a priori, this project instead explores and queries what we are actually seeing: patterns of activity specific to the platform, such as Reddit. To connect such patterns of activity to a broader framework informed by the theoretical assumptions of online extremism, frame analysis and social network analysis are used to observe and qualify the alt-right in 2 forms. First, thread activity is qualified as frames that represent Reddit’s content. Second, 2-mode networks of frames, users and subreddits constitute ephemeral instances of the alt-right. By delineating the alt-right into 2 interrelated units of analysis, this project captures the alt-right as an ephemeral component of a broader social media platform infrastructure. What we see of the alt-right at one moment is contingent to what Reddit is at that time. This approach explicitly problematises the longstanding pattern of assuming that our conventional units of analysis apply to platform activity. It is necessary to first understand what is happening as a platform activity before translating it to a conventional unit of analysis.
At ANU, I am studying the intersection of platform affordances and online extremism. My research argues that the two are producing qualitatively distinct phenomena from what informs the theories that underpin online extremism. Relevantly, I am also arguing that these phenomena require specific methodological approaches that privilege the details of the platform's infrastructure over conventional expectations about the phenomenon.
Generally speaking, I am interested in extremism of all types, platforms and the role of technology in contemporary life. My research is also informed by a significant interest in grand social theories, particularly those of Ulrich Beck and Manuel Castells.