Political Media: Social Media Activism and Platforms

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This new course explores aspects of film and media studies’ evolution in the wake of the influential (and elastic) digital humanities (DH) turn during the early 2000s. Propelled in large measure by the advent of YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp, WeChat, Tumblr, and other social media platforms, citizen journalism, hashtag activism, remix and meme cultures, digital media technologies in the 21st century require new epistemologies to understand some new modes and codes of interactive media production, consumption, and circulation. Thus, we will interrogate humanistic approaches to video game studies contemporary media studies that have expanded to include software, code, and platform studies that too often bifurcates DH into oppositional camps of so-called “makers” and “talkers.” In this vein our seminar will also explore political economies of social media activism and diffusion among diverse population blocs (local and global) and modern political movements/organizations such as MoveOn.org, Obama for America, Netroots Nation, American Crossroads, the Tea Party, Wikileaks, Black Lives Matter, the Woman’s March, among others. As we approach 2020, a consequential electoral cycle in U.S. politics, this seminar is particular timely.