Friday, October 23, 2015

Joel Penney and Caroline Dadas--"(Re)Tweeting in the service of protest: Digital composition and circulation in the Occupy Wall Street movement"


new media & society 2014, Vol. 16(1) 74–90 © The Author(s) 2013 

"The OWS case study demonstrates how the rapid digital circulation of texts allows protestors to quickly build a geographically dispersed, networked counterpublic that can articulate a critique of power outside of the parameters of mainstream media...
By including these forwarding activities in their online efforts, these Twitter users worked to expand the circulation of information building and sustaining an OWS counterpublic. However, dependence on this external platform leaves protestors vulnerable to restrictions on their ability to communicate, as well as to unwanted surveillance from potentially hostile authorities"


 

"In a collectively written declaration posted on their website, the OWS protesters in New York City outlined their grievances, explaining that they 'gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice' regarding the way in which 'corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. With the slogan 'We are the 99%' serving as a rallying cry, the OWS movement has continued to employ direct action (such as encampments, marches, and demonstrations) as well as non-traditional media outreach to publicize a broad-based critique of corporate power and its influence on the political process" (75).

The OWS movement created the #occupywallstreet hashtag and "Twitter served a variety of purposes, as users attempted to coordinate their activities and publicize their critiques of contemporary capitalism in ways that bypassed the mainstream media" (75).

The authors cite Jenkins Convergence Culture, writing that "those silences by corporate media have been among the first to transform their computer into a printing press."

"The ends to which users...incorporate Twitter into their protest activities represent the focus of this article...we present a typology of Twitter users, focusing on how both tweeting and retweeting functions have been utilized in conjunction with face-to-face protests...Thus, we seek to present a portrayal of technology use in the material/historical context of a broad-based social movement" (75).
"We believe that by drawing from the rich body of work established by both fields [rhetoric/composition and communication], we can come to a better understanding of complex rhetorical situations such as Occupy Wall Street, discovering how people are using language to construct new social and political realities, and how they are incorporating social media technologies into that process" (75).
--Digitally networked technologies, protest movements, and counterpublics
 "The emerging scholarship on this phenomenon [social media and protests] has highlighted a number of key functions that the social web may serve in protest movements" (76). The various social media platforms allow protesters to organize before ever meeting face-to-face and document via citizen journalism."However, since digital networked technologies and their applications are developing so rapidly in the contemporary context...it is important for scholars to continue to chart how protest movements are utilizing various new online tools for a range of purposes" (76).
"Specifically, the OWS movement has been noted for adopting a leaderless, horizontal structure which has been characterized by Hardy and Negri (2011) as the 'multitude form.'...As Hardy and Negri suggest, this focus on non-hierarchical organization may account for the movement's widespread use of social media platforms which operate in a horizontal, peer-to-peer fashion and encourage diffuse popular participation" (76).
 The use of Twitter to update and quickly disseminate information and collect feedback supports the horizontal organization.  Warner notes in Publics and Counterpublics that a counterpublic "enables a horizon of opinion and exchange; its exchanges remain distinct from authority and can have a critical relation to power." Publics, according to Warner shift with the "circulation of discourse. 

"we are interested here in how Twitter is used as a privileged tool for building horizontal, 'multitude'-like networks of exchange that facilitate, supplement and extend face-to-face protest movements" (77).

According to N. Fraser, counterpublics widen the audience. She claims that the counterpublics' strength "rests in its ability 'to disseminate one's discourse into ever widening arena's'" (77).

"The use of networked digital technologies in contemporary protest movements has greatly intensified this dialectic between internal and external publics, as messages shared via online platforms have the potential to find worldwide audiences" (77).

Many authors use the term "rhetorical circulation" to define the quick delivery style of Twitter messages, which requires that its users be rhetorically savvy about how to disseminate message effective with only 140 characters. ***This may overlap with "rhetorical velocity." Since composers know that the tweet will be brief and widely circulated very quickly, the nature of twitter influence the composition of the message itself. "Circulation and composition are inextricably linked, demonstrating how the rhetorical canons of invention, arrangement, and delivery all inform each other within a composing situation. Thus, we call attention to circulation as a major consideration in how users capitalize on the affordances of Twitter, how the OWS movement has become so dispersed and has grown so quickly, and how the OWS network on Twitter functions as a counterpublic" (77).

--Methods

"This small purposive sample is not intended to be representative of Twitter-using OWS activists as a whole, and therefore there are limitations to the study's generalizability. We believe that the rich first-hand data gained from this small-scale qualitative interview study has a useful role to play in theory-building" (78).

--Using Twitter in OWS: seven overlapping roles

The study revealed seven main ways in which respondents use Twitter in conjunction with OWS: "facilitating face-to-face protests via advertisements and donation solicitation; forwarding news via links and retweets; expressing personal opinions regarding the movement; engaging in discussion about the movement; making personal connection with fellow activists; and facilitating online-based actions...Together, this typology of roles helps to elucidate the complex and interconnected ways in which OWS activists use Twitter in the service of the movement" (79).

e-mobilization

these are "situations in which 'the web is used to facilitate the sharing of information in the service of an offline protest action.' Emobilization focuses specifically on how online communication tools are used to essentially mimic more traditional forms of protest mobilization--in particular, formal advertisements announcing time and date information. Here, Twitter essentially extends and magnifies the reach of earlier print-based promotional tools such as leaflets, fliers, and posters, getting word out about upcoming events rapidly and to a potentially broader audience" (79).

Twitter was also used to increase attendance and organize/propel events in progress. The protestors were able to communicate needs in real time. "This point draws attention to the increasing hybridity between online and offline spaces of protest engendered by mobile social media, and suggests how Earl and Kimport's (2011) concept of e-mobilization can be refined in order to account for recent technological and social developments" (80).

Live reporting from face-to-face protests (citizen journalism)

"smartphones allow attendees to become peer-to-peer citizen journalists, sharing updates, photos, and video of protests with worldwide audiences in real time...reports from in-progress actions served as an informal means of promoting attendance...live updates also could serve a practical function, particularly when documenting altercations with police...Because the Twitter infrastructure contains low barriers to accessing other people's online activity...new OWS participants and supporters may learn about the movement (and may even be compelled to join) by seeing a tweet such as Richard's: that is, one draws attention to the ongoing tension between protestors and the police" (80).

Live tweeting also helped to extend the meetings to people who weren't there. "Thus, the protesters' ability to use smartphones to document the movement's one-the-ground activities in real time contributed to an expanding role for citizen journalism, as live-tweeters could bridge the gap between online and offline spaces of engagement--as well as internal and external publics--in multiple ways" (81).

Retweeting information and incorporating links (second-hand circulation)

OWS protestors used retweeting to share news stories. "In many cases, respondents prefaced these links to mainstream news stories with introductory text in order to place the story in the context of OWS discourse. By writing new headlines, activists could not only help their followers quickly understand and easily index the articles, but also reframe the material in their own terms" (81).

The protestors also used retweeting to create alternative forms of new media. Reposts and retweets help to boost the movements notoriety. "The utility of this Twitter-enabled alternative news network to supplement or counter-act problematic mainstream press coverage was stressed by numerous respondents...By simply forwarding news about the protests and related issues in a peer-to-peer fashion, these Twitter users actively contributed to the growth of an OWS counter-public, expanding it beyond the boundaries of any one physical locale" (82).

Expressing personal views about the movement (editorial commentary)

Protestors used Twitter to both make recommendations to the movements and voice their concerns about what the movement was fighting against.

Engaging in discussion regarding the movement (online deliberation)

Participants noted that Twitter isn't a good platform for discussing the movement with detractors. "Scholars in the field of rhetoric and composition and elsewhere have addressed the limits of online deliberative dialogue, pointing out that characteristics such as anonymity and low barriers to entry/exit make dialogue between disagreeing parties challenging. The data from out study suggest that the same patterns often hold true for Twitter, although users continue to seek out this platform as a space for engaging in deliberative dialogue, despite frequent frustration" (83).

Making connections with fellow activists (strengthening ties)

Twitter helped strengthen the bonds between members of the movement. "By interacting informally with other like-minded activists, some respondents noted gaining a sense of community, solidarity, and group identity" (83).

"such building of social ties has long been recognized as an integral aspect of building social movements...reinforcing the activists' commitment to their own participation" (83)

"their experiences draw attention to how social media platforms blur the boundaries between the social and the political, contributing to community and solidarity-building which may serve as a pretext for more direct participation in protests. Thus, the important role of informal tie-building...should be included in our understanding of the multiple and complex ways in which digital platforms like Twitter are used in the service of protest movements" (84).

Facilitating online-based actions

Some used Twitter to protest, petition, and lobby politicians online. "Rather than existing in isolation, the multiple ways in which this social media tool was utilized in the service of the movement thus appeared to reinforce each other in a number of important respects" (84).

The overlapping nature of activist roles on Twitter

Protestors often mixed the aforementioned genres. They aren't mutually exclusive.

"tweets in the OWS counterpublic always serve multiple audiences and multiple purposes" (85).

"Finally, an important point to emphasize is the large degree of fluidity between composing original tweets and forwarding those written by others. For many respondents, their relay of pre-existing material appeared to be just as meaningful a form of participation as drafting original tweets...By including these forwarding activities as part of their online participation, these Twitter users worked to expand the circulation of information, building and sustaining the OWS counterpublic" (85).

Communicating in the horizontal crowd: the 140 character limit

"The centrality of circulating information in a peer-to-peer horizontal structure appeared to shape the composition of original messages to a large extent" (86). Users knew during composition that they needed to be succinct and that their messages should readily catch the attention fo the audience.

"The ability to have a tweet reposted by someone else means that rhetorically savvy users often compose with this potentiality in mind. In other words, users who utilize Twitter often compose with 'rhetorical velocity'...As Sheridan et al. explains, 'Thinking about rhetorical velocity includes...rhetorical concerns about what might motivate a third party to redistribute and/or recompose the text, or what might give the text future velocity'...they had to pay attention to how they could work within the constraints of the platform to enable future distribution" (85).

Most activist saw the 140 word limit as beneficial instead of constraining. "here Twitter was conceptualized as only one part of a much larger digital ecosystem that offered activists many different ways to communicate" (86). If people wanted a more expansive outlet, they would blog and then tweet a link to their blog. "Twitter should be understood as one part of a broader digital media effort of OWS which served a particular role" (86).

Within a horizontally organized movement, the "quick-moving, attention-grabbing, byte-sized communication" was beneficial. "With thousands of members needing to share information without a hierarchical communication structure...messages must be crafted for easy circulation and indexing. This privileges brevity over length, timeliness over reflectiveness, and an overall focus on piquancy in the service of grabbing the attention of a decentralized network. Thus, the concept of 'rhetorical velocity' helps to account for how horizontal protest movements like OWS capitalize on the affordances of Twitter to foster circulation and quickly build new counterpublics" (86). 

Concerns about Twitter as a platform for protest: restrictions and surveillance

Most protestors like Twitter but they also expressed concerns about "relying on an external, coporate-owned social media platform as the basis for these activities" (86-87). They also worried that its open-ended nature allowed law enforcement to keep tabs on the group. "the fact that they do not control the platform means that this freedom does indeed come with constraints" (87).

Twitter also seemed to tightly regulate what they would allow to trend as a hashtag.

Interestingly, Twitter acted as a platform to voice anger about censorship, which worked to help reduce censorship.

"a more pressing concern was how using Twitter made OWS activists vulnerable to government and police surveillance...Twitter can be forced by the courts to turn over records of tweets if they contain information pertinent to legal proceedings" (87).

"they perceived the potential solution to lie not in the avoidance of social media technologies but rather in their more careful and clever use" (88).

Conclusion

 "For protest movements such as OWS that adopt a non-hierarchical, horizontal structure as a matter of political and philosophical principle, Twitter's participatory and networked structure of circulation seems to hold particular importance, as its very form resonates with these broader organizational dynamics. This suggests that Twitter will continue to be embraced by such horizontal protest movements as a central locus of promotion, information-sharing, organizing, and community building in years to come" (89).

"Dependence on external platforms leaves protesters vulnerable to restrictions on their ability to communicate (including the possibility of politically motivated censorship), as well as to unwanted surveillance from authorities who have notably exercised the legal right to access digital records...the widespread reliance on commercial platforms such as Twitter means that such tensions will continure to be of concern for contemporary protest movements" (89).

"the opportunities to build widespread counterpublics across geographic boundaries presented by popular social media platforms also come with significant attending risk. When utilizing a digital architecture that they do not control, movements like OWS must continually navigate around the incursions of those who do in fact hold this control and may be potentially hostile to the goals of the movement. Indeed, the ongoing struggles between protesters and entities like Twitter over the right to freely compose and circulate texts on their own terms will likely shape the future development of online participation in protest movements to a large degree" (89).


 







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