Anastasia Kavada | University of Westminster (original) (raw)
Anastasia Kavada is a Reader in Media and Politics in the School of Media and Communication at the University of Westminster. She is Co-Leader of the MA in Media, Campaigning and Social Change. She is also a Co-Leader of the Arts, Communication and Culture Research Community.
Her research interests include the relationship between online tools, advocacy groups and social movements. She is particularly interested in the role of the internet in processes of organizing, decision-making and collective identity formation, as well as in how online tools affect the activists’ interaction with the media and with the targets of their campaigns.
Phone: +44(0)20 7911 50000 ext.4155
Address: Website:
www.digitalprotest.net
University of Westminster
Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
School of Media, Arts & Design
University of Westminster
Harrow Campus
Watford Road
Northwick Park
Harrow MIDDX HA1 3TP
United Kingdom
less
Uploads
Papers by Anastasia Kavada
This paper examines the process through which Occupy activists came to constitute themselves as a... more This paper examines the process through which Occupy activists came to constitute themselves as a collective actor and the role of social media in this process. The theoretical framework combines Melucci's (1996) theory of collective identity with insights from the field of organizational communication and particularly from the ‘CCO’ strand – short for ‘Communication is Constitutive of Organizing’. This allows us to conceptualize collective identity as an open-ended and dynamic process that is constructed in conversations and codified in texts. Based on interviews with Occupy activists in New York, London and other cities, I then discuss the communication processes through which the movement was drawing the boundaries with its environment, creating codes and foundational documents, as well as speaking in a collective voice. The findings show that social media tended to blur the boundaries between the inside and the outside of the movement in a way that suited its values of inclusiveness and direct participation. Social media users could also follow remotely the meetings of the general assembly where the foundational documents were ratified, but their voices were not included in the process. The presence of the movement on social media also led to conflicts and negotiations around Occupy's collective voice as constructed on these platforms. Thus, viewing the movement as a phenomenon emerging in communication allows us an insight into the efforts of Occupy activists to create a collective that was both inclusive of the 99% and a distinctive actor with its own identity.
‘Big Data’ has become a flashpoint in conversations in a range of disciplines across the humaniti... more ‘Big Data’ has become a flashpoint in conversations in a range of disciplines across the humanities and social sciences. As advances in computational methods expand the ter- rain of the measurable, the identifiable, and the knowable, they also raise thorny questions around the politics and ethics of academic research. In an era marked by the thoroughgoing digitalization of virtually every domain of our lives, changes in how information about human behavior is gathered, circulated, and made sense of both unsettles and reinforces existing power dynamics.
This Special Crosscurrents Issue of Media, Culture and Society aims to spark a debate on ‘Big Data’ from the dis- ciplinary location of ‘media and communication studies’ and more specifically, the emergent field of digital media studies.
MedieKultur | Journal of media and communication research | ISSN 1901-9726 Article Published by S... more MedieKultur | Journal of media and communication research | ISSN 1901-9726 Article Published by SMID | Society of Media researchers In Denmark | www.smid.dk The online version of this text can be found open access at www.mediekultur.dk 28
This paper attempts to explore the role of the internet in the processes of organization and mobi... more This paper attempts to explore the role of the internet in the processes of organization and mobilization of the 'movement for alternative globalization', which is often characterized as an 'internet-based movement'. It reports the findings of a survey undertaken in the Paris 2003 European Social Forum (ESF), which asked 257 respondents about the contexts that mobilized them to participate in the ESF (political/voluntary organizations, friends/relatives, workplace/university, news media), as well as the modes and methods of communication that were used in each context. The findings question the claims about the internet-based character of this movement, as face-to-face contact seems to be the predominant mode of communication. The survey also challenges the much discussed potential of the internet to mobilize politically indifferent or marginalized individuals, as a comparison between users and non-users of the internet revealed that users tended to be mobilized for the ESF through political or voluntary organizations.
… paper presented at 'Contemporary Anti-War …, Jan 1, 2003
Distinguished by its transnational scale, non-hierarchical organizing, and diverse composition, t... more Distinguished by its transnational scale, non-hierarchical organizing, and diverse composition, the'movement for alternative globalization'is thought to partly derive this combination of characteristics from its use of the internet. My research is an attempt to ...
This paper examines the process through which Occupy activists came to constitute themselves as a... more This paper examines the process through which Occupy activists came to constitute themselves as a collective actor and the role of social media in this process. The theoretical framework combines Melucci's (1996) theory of collective identity with insights from the field of organizational communication and particularly from the ‘CCO’ strand – short for ‘Communication is Constitutive of Organizing’. This allows us to conceptualize collective identity as an open-ended and dynamic process that is constructed in conversations and codified in texts. Based on interviews with Occupy activists in New York, London and other cities, I then discuss the communication processes through which the movement was drawing the boundaries with its environment, creating codes and foundational documents, as well as speaking in a collective voice. The findings show that social media tended to blur the boundaries between the inside and the outside of the movement in a way that suited its values of inclusiveness and direct participation. Social media users could also follow remotely the meetings of the general assembly where the foundational documents were ratified, but their voices were not included in the process. The presence of the movement on social media also led to conflicts and negotiations around Occupy's collective voice as constructed on these platforms. Thus, viewing the movement as a phenomenon emerging in communication allows us an insight into the efforts of Occupy activists to create a collective that was both inclusive of the 99% and a distinctive actor with its own identity.
‘Big Data’ has become a flashpoint in conversations in a range of disciplines across the humaniti... more ‘Big Data’ has become a flashpoint in conversations in a range of disciplines across the humanities and social sciences. As advances in computational methods expand the ter- rain of the measurable, the identifiable, and the knowable, they also raise thorny questions around the politics and ethics of academic research. In an era marked by the thoroughgoing digitalization of virtually every domain of our lives, changes in how information about human behavior is gathered, circulated, and made sense of both unsettles and reinforces existing power dynamics.
This Special Crosscurrents Issue of Media, Culture and Society aims to spark a debate on ‘Big Data’ from the dis- ciplinary location of ‘media and communication studies’ and more specifically, the emergent field of digital media studies.
MedieKultur | Journal of media and communication research | ISSN 1901-9726 Article Published by S... more MedieKultur | Journal of media and communication research | ISSN 1901-9726 Article Published by SMID | Society of Media researchers In Denmark | www.smid.dk The online version of this text can be found open access at www.mediekultur.dk 28
This paper attempts to explore the role of the internet in the processes of organization and mobi... more This paper attempts to explore the role of the internet in the processes of organization and mobilization of the 'movement for alternative globalization', which is often characterized as an 'internet-based movement'. It reports the findings of a survey undertaken in the Paris 2003 European Social Forum (ESF), which asked 257 respondents about the contexts that mobilized them to participate in the ESF (political/voluntary organizations, friends/relatives, workplace/university, news media), as well as the modes and methods of communication that were used in each context. The findings question the claims about the internet-based character of this movement, as face-to-face contact seems to be the predominant mode of communication. The survey also challenges the much discussed potential of the internet to mobilize politically indifferent or marginalized individuals, as a comparison between users and non-users of the internet revealed that users tended to be mobilized for the ESF through political or voluntary organizations.
… paper presented at 'Contemporary Anti-War …, Jan 1, 2003
Distinguished by its transnational scale, non-hierarchical organizing, and diverse composition, t... more Distinguished by its transnational scale, non-hierarchical organizing, and diverse composition, the'movement for alternative globalization'is thought to partly derive this combination of characteristics from its use of the internet. My research is an attempt to ...