"This article discusses activists’ need to reflect on how achieving social media visibility might translate into vulnerability. In order to provide activists with a tool for this reflection, the Stepping into Visibility Model has been developed and applied to two case studies: (a) an activist grou
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p in a Brazilian favela using social media for protection against police brutality and (b) a Kenyan photographer, affiliated to an art-ivist (artistic and activist) collective, producing images of Nairobi at night to tackle social anxiety issues. The research draws from sociological insights on the concept of ‘visibility’ and adopts a case study methodology combined with ethnographic approaches. By adopting a Global South perspective, it discusses counter surveillance efforts in ways that go beyond techno-legal solutionism (Dencik et al, 2016) and in periods outside that of big-scale protests (McCosker, 2015). By devising this model, we hope to offer a contribution on how marginalised communities can be better informed when they encounter unintended negative visibility." (Abstract)
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"In the rapidly changing news ecosystems of emerging economies, news outlets are struggling to remain relevant and build loyal relationships with youth audiences (18 to 35 years old). As youth populations continue to grow in low-and-middle income countries, it is critical for independent media organ
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izations to understand and respond to the changing news habits of younger generations. A snapshot of youth news consumption habits in Colombia, Ghana, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, and Thailand highlights that the predominance of smartphones, and increasing access to the internet and social media, is fundamentally altering how youth access, interact with, and value independent news. Youth audiences tend to access news through their smartphone, relying more on social media algorithms and news aggregators than loyalty to particular news brands. Youth generally do not feel that the traditional, mainstream news media reports on issues that are important to them, preferring to access a wider variety of news alongside other kinds of information and entertainment. Despite relying on social media for news, youth are wary about whether the information they see on the internet is true. There is a tension between the convenience social media provides for accessing news and its propensity to amplify misinformation and increase political polarization." (Key findings)
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"Starting from the assumption that media play a crucial role for populist discourses of authenticity, the volume moves beyond conventional and social media by expanding its focus to media in formal education, notably school textbooks and curricula. These two particular media formats lastingly shape
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younger generations and thus the future. The proposed volume adopts global perspectives from three postcolonial countries that are often beyond the scope of studies dealing with populist discourses and media entanglements - insights that contribute new aspects to international scholarly debates." (Publisher description)
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"Why and how can records serve as evidence of human rights violations, in particular crimes against humanity, and help the fight against impunity? Archives and Human Rights shows the close relationship between archives and human rights and discusses the emergence, at the international level, of the
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principles of the right to truth, justice and reparation. Through a historical overview and topical case studies from different regions of the world the book discusses how records can concretely support these principles. The current examples also demonstrate how the perception of the role of the archivist has undergone a metamorphosis in recent decades, towards the idea that archivists can and must play an active role in defending basic human rights, first and foremost by enabling access to documentation on human rights violations. Confronting painful memories of the past is a way to make the ghosts disappear and begin building a brighter, more serene future. The establishment of international justice mechanisms and the creation of truth commissions are important elements of this process. The healing begins with the acknowledgment that painful chapters are essential parts of history; archives then play a crucial role by providing evidence. This book is both a tool and an inspiration to use archives in defence of human rights." (Publisher description)
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"In this paper, we present an account of how FARC-EP ex-combatants are using digital technology in the process of reincorporating into Colombian society. We report findings showing how this technology mediates the difficult task of transitioning from a culture of opposition to civilian members and a
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ctive political actors. Using the concept of social capital as a framework, we investigate the intersection between the use of digital toolsand developing cultural and economic practices among these groups during this transitional period. Reflecting on the bonding and bridging aspects of social capital, we describe how ex-combatants draw on substantial social capital from their former lives as a guerrilla army in order to strengthen their position in these new circumstances, and their cautious and difficult creation of new social ties with wider Colombian society. We contribute to the CSCW discourse by discussing the crucial role digital tools, previously not available to these groups, play in sustaining, re-growing and building social capital of communities in post-conflict periods." (Summary)
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"The mainstream media in Brazil portrays favelas (unregulated low-income neighbourhoods) in a negative light. This has been the case since their emergence over a century ago. Voices from the Favelas navigates through the contemporary representation of the favelas in the established media, discussing
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how this partial representation impacts issues of identity and social segregation, the legitimation of structural violence in those sites, and providing an account of the recent emergence of digital social networks as “counterpublics”. In order to understand the struggle against the characterisation of the favela as a site dominated by violence (a framework which has been disseminated on a global scale and accepted as the norm), this book will take its readers inside the mindset of the favela media activists, examining the production of information and the organisation of the residents as they resist and challenge the status quo." (Publisher description)
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"Uruguay es el primer país del Cono Sur de América Latina en realizar una evaluación integral de su paisaje mediático utilizando los Indicadores de Desarrollo Mediatico (IDMs) de la UNESCO. Y, lo que es único de este ejercicio, es que todas las facultades de comunicación del país colaboraron
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en el proceso de investigación, en alianza con la Oficina Regional de Ciencias de la UNESCO para América Latina y el Caribe. El resultado es un informe que evalúa el nivel de desarrollo de los medios de comunicación públicos, privados y comunitarios, y proporciona un exhaustivo análisis del panorama mediático del país, ya sea de su marco legislativo como de su pluralidad y diversidad de medios. Si la UNESCO reedita en 2021 este estudio llevado a cabo entre 2014 y 2017 es por su utilidad en el examen del cumplimiento de las leyes, actuales o futuras, con estándares internacionales en materia de libertad de expresión, ofrenciendo una hoja de ruta para futuras reformas de legislación de medios." (Reverso)
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"Las comunidades indígenas de la región amazónica peruana fueron duramente golpeadas por la pandemia de la COVID-19. Prácticamente desde sus inicios, surgieron distintas iniciativas para informar adecuadamente en las lenguas originarias a las comunidades, pero también otras que permitieran cont
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ribuir a paliar y reducir los impactos de la pandemia. En este artículo analizamos un proyecto implementado para enfrentar la pandemia de la COVID-19 así como otras emergencias sanitarias en general. Este proyecto fue diseñado en conjunto con el equipo de comunicadores indígenas de Radio Ucamara, ubicada en la ciudad de Nauta (región Loreto), en la Amazonía nororiental del Perú. El principal objetivo de este proyecto fue el de convertir a la radio en un centro o hub comunicacional que permita el flujo de información sobre la situación de salud de las comunidades indígenas a las autoridades regionales, y viceversa, de tal manera que permita una atención en salud primaria oportuna y culturalmente pertinente." (Resumen)
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"This research scrutinizes the content, spread, and implications of disinformation in Brazil’s 2018 pre-election period. It focuses specifically on the most widely shared fake news about Lula da Silva and links these with the preexisting polarization and political radicalization, ascertaining the
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role of context. The research relied on a case study and mixed-methods approach that combined an online data collection of content, spread, propagators, and interactions’ analyses, with in-depth analysis of the meaning of such fake news. The results show that the most successful fake news about Lula capitalized on prior hostility toward him, several originated or were spread by conservative right-wing politicians and mainstream journalists, and that the pro-Lula fake news circulated in smaller networks and had overall less global reach. Facebook and WhatsApp were the main dissemination platforms of these contents." (Abstract)
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"In this article, we analyze the spread of political disinformation in events of discursive struggles on Twitter, during the 2018 presidential election in Brazil. These were disputes for the hegemonic narrative between two stories based on opposed hashtags: one based on news from mainstream media an
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d the other, based on disinformation, mostly from hyperpartisan outlets. Our goal was to understand how hyperpartisan outlets created and shaped these discursive struggles and the strategies used to spread disinformation to create an “alternative narrative” to the facts. Our case study is focused on two discursive struggles, for which we will use critical discourse analysis and social network analysis. Our findings suggest that (1) the structure of the hashtag wars was very polarized and right-wing groups had higher exposure to hyperpartisan content and disinformation, while traditional media discourse circulates more among other different ideological clusters; (2) rightwing hyperpartisan media mostly used biased framing and polarized ideological discourse structure as manipulative strategies to reframe the events and create a counter-narrative (and thus, to create the dispute); and (3) opinion leaders were major spreaders of disinformation among far-right users, as they reinforced hyperpartisan content and became key actors in the discursive struggles (and thus, reinforced the dispute)." (Abstract)
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"Drawing on a qualitative analysis of 7,506 tweets by state-sponsored accounts from Russia’s GRU and the Internet Research Agency (IRA), Iran, and Venezuela, this article examines the gender dimensions of foreign influence operations. By examining the political communication of feminism and women
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s rights, we find, first, that foreign state actors co-opted intersectional critiques and countermovement narratives about feminism and female empowerment to demobilize civil society activists, spread progovernment propaganda, and generate virality around divisive political topics. Second, 10 amplifier accounts—particularly from the Russian IRA and GRU—drove more than one-third of the Twitter conversations about feminism and women’s rights. Third, high-profile feminist politicians, activists, celebrities, and journalists were targeted with character attacks by the Russian GRU. These attacks happened indirectly, reinforcing a culture of hate rather than attempting to stifle or suppress the expression of rights through threats or harassment. This comparative look at the online political communication of women’s rights by foreign state actors highlights distinct blueprints for foreign influence operations while enriching the literature about the unique challenges women face online." (Abstract)
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"The intersection of media with theology is reciprocating: media boosts theology in its functions to inform, connect and educate; theology humbles the globalizing media with a reminder – media is in mediation but not in domination. Media and theology thus intersect at mediating (negotiating, inter
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ceding, resisting, protesting) and they should avoid the temptation to colonize. The essays are presented in two overlapping clusters: Mediascapes (intersection of media and a selection of land- and sea-scapes) and Mediations (implications of mediating theology for interrogating hegemonies). The topics addressed include social media and #tag cultures, the fourth industrial revolution and artificial intelligence, homiletics, social resistance, Palestine, Latin America, climate change, and Covid-19." (Publisher description)
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"The intersection between media and politics remains very strong in several countries under study. In these conditions, there is often little transparency on media ownership and a lack of transparency on local funding sources of media. Relatedly, in some cases, a change in government policies was ra
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ised as an important precondition to possibly change the negative discourse towards the (public) media. A different political climate may benefit the financial conditions of a media outlet, for instance by lifting difficulties in acquiring media licenses or access to (governmental) funding by independent media. The advertisement markets for media are, in many of the countries under study, still controlled by a few large, more traditional media outlets. Generally, the advertising market is driven by a number of factors, including a network, political patronage, and the ability of media owners to utilise relationships with the corporate sector. Due to the digitalisation of media and the advertising market, the market has further changed over the past years. There is limited to no regulation in the distribution of advertisement funding based on quality standards for journalism. Some media practitioners proposed to address this problem by stimulating national governments to support regulatory bodies for media advertisement. While digital advertisement is on the rise, most revenue of online (media) advertisement is directed to big tech companies. An increased amount of advertising money is flowing towards social media platforms, and Internet advertising has been rising exponentially, as observed in all countries under study. The media sector as a whole is suffering from this trend, particularly the more traditional print media who are struggling to make the transition to online media. In some countries under study, media are not even eligible to generate an income on the large social media platforms. Policies to regulate online advertisement is imperative to strengthen the competition position of traditional media." (Global trends, page 9)
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"Este libro es –nunca mejor dicho– el resultado de una memoria selectiva. Sus 19 títulos dan cuenta de un ciclo que cierra una etapa inicial del Seminario Pensar lo Real como espacio de reflexión en torno a ‘lo documental’. Estuvo inspirado en el espíritu de Pensar el documental, un encue
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ntro sin duda iniciático, organizado por el Ministerio de Cultura de Colombia en 1998. El encuentro que tuvo como invitados a Patricio Guzmán, Anne Baudry, Nicolás Philibert, Óscar Campo y Marta Rodríguez, entre otros destacados cineastas, tuvo el mérito de impulsar la creación de Alados y, a su vez, de la mano de lo que es hoy una asociación pionera de documentalistas en América Latina, abrió paso a lo que sería durante estas dos décadas1 el largo proceso de consolidación de una Muestra Internacional Documental de Bogotá - MIDBO." (Descripción de la casa editorial)
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