"While the field of Journalism Studies has already engaged in rich debates on how to rethink the truth conditions of user-generated content (UGC) in platform journalism, we argue that it has missed out on the ethico-political function of UGC as testimonials of lives-at-risk. If we wish to recognize
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and act on UGC as techno-social practices of witnessing human pain and death, we propose, then we need to push further the conceptual and analytical boundaries of the field. In this paper, we do this by introducing a view of UGC as flesh witnessing, that is as embodied and mobile testimonies of vulnerable others that, enabled by smartphones, enter global news environments as appeals to attention and action. Drawing on examples from the Syrian conflict, we provide an analysis of the narrative strategies through which flesh witnessing acquires truth-telling authority and we reflect on what is gained and lost in the process. Western story-telling, we conclude, strategically co-opts the affective dimension of flesh witnessing – its focus on child innocence, heroic martyrdom or the data aesthetics of destruction – and selectively minimizes its urgency by downplaying or effacing the bodies of non-western witnesses. This preoccupation with verification should not be subject to geopolitical formulations and needs to be combined with an explicit acknowledgement of the embodied voices of conflict as testimonies of the flesh whose often mortal vulnerability is, in fact, the very condition of possibility upon which western broadcasting rests." (Abstract)
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"Consejo de Redacción presenta esta breve guía con recomendaciones para que periodistas, comunicadores y comunicadoras, y medios de comunicación puedan incluir en su quehacer un periodismo con enfoque de género que sea sensible al conflicto. Este documento contiene un contexto sobre la situació
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n de las mujeres periodistas en el país, recomendaciones para hacer un periodismo de género sensible al conflicto, un protocolo de prevención de violencias y seguridad para las mujeres en terreno y termina con unas recomendaciones de seguridad digital." (Presentación, página 5)
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"The recent “emotional turn” in journalism studies has yet to substantially focus on the role that affect and emotion play in specific practices of journalism. This paper examines the affective/emotional dimensions of journalists coping with exhaustion during a reporting assignment in South Suda
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n to explore the ways in which the these might meaningfully alter how the practice is performed. I argue that affect/emotion ought not to be understood as simply a form of failure to act rationally, or affective baggage picked up as a result of practice, but as integral to practices of journalism itself. I use the example of exhaustion, its effects on the practices of journalists and their responses to it to point to types of affective/emotional work that journalists undertake in order to both do journalism safely and successfully and to do work which is recognisably “professional” journalism." (Abstract)
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"This book conceptually examines the role of communication in global jihad from multiple perspectives. The main premise is that communication is so vital to the global jihadist movement today that jihadists will use any communicative tool, tactic, or approach to impact or transform people and the pu
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blic at large. The author explores how and why the benefits of communication are a huge boon to jihadist operations, with jihadists communicating their ideological programs to develop a strong base for undertaking terrorist violence. The use of various information and communication systems and platforms by jihadists exemplifies the most recent progress in the relationship between terrorism, media, and the new information environment. For jihadist organizations like ISIS and Al-Qaeda, recruiting new volunteers for the Caliphate who are willing to sacrifice their lives for the cause is a top priority. Based on various conceptual analyses, case studies, and theoretical applications, this book explores the communicative tools, tactics, and approaches used for this recruitment, including narratives, propaganda, mainstream media, social media, new information and communication technologies, the jihadisphere, visual imagery, media framing, globalization, financing networks, crime - jihad nexuses, group communication, radicalization, social movements, fatwas, martyrdom videos, pop-jihad, and jihadist nasheeds." (Publisher description)
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"[Ce livre] examine les pratiques journalistiques qui ont caractérisé la couverture médiatique du conflit armé ayant opposé les Forces armées de la RDC à la rébellion du Mouvement du 23 mars (M23) dans la province du Nord Kivu. L’auteur scrute le positionnement des journalistes des radios
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congolaises et étrangères face aux discours et actions déployés par les protagonistes du conflit en vue d’exercer un contrôle absolu sur la production et la diffusion de l’information, une composante importante de la stratégie militaire en situation de conflit. Pas moins de trente heures d’informations diffusées sur cinq radios (Kivu One et VBR de Goma, Top Congo FM et Radio Okapi de Kinshasa, RFI émettant depuis Paris) sont confrontées aux discours de dix-neuf journalistes présents sur le terrain lors des événements. Cette confrontation éclaire sur l’incidence des conditions de production dans la construction des récits produits." (Dos de couverture)
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"This book discusses the relationship between media, conflict and democratisation in Africa from the perspective of media ethics. Despite the commonly held view that conflict is a destructive political force that can destabilize democracies, the argument in this book is that while many conflicts can
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become violent and destructive, they can also be managed in a way that can render them productive and communicative to democracy. Drawing on theoretical insights from the fields of journalism studies, political studies and cultural studies, the book discusses the ethics of conflict coverage and proposes a normative model for covering conflict and democratisation. The book argues for an 'ethics of listening' which would enable the media to de-escalate violent conflict and contribute to the deepening of an agonistic democratic culture in contexts of high inequality, ethnic and racial polarisation and uneven access to media. This argument is illustrated by examples drawn from recent events in African democracies such as student protests, community activism, struggles for resources and social media conflicts. The book also scrutinizes the media's ethical roles and responsibilities in African societies by considering questions regarding journalistic professionalism, ethical codes and regulation in the context of rising misinformation." (Publisher description)
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"Social media companies face an increasingly urgent ethical dilemma about the use of their platforms by Taliban officials and supporters." (Introduction)
"The text presents the results of the external evaluation of the project: ‘Community Radio for Peace and Coexistence’ (CRPC), implemented between 2015 and 2017 by the community media network RESANDER, with the support of the Colombian Government and the European Union. Considering that community
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radios are key actors for the construction of public dialogue and collective action about peace and coexistence in the Colombian territories, the purpose of the CRPC project was to strengthen community radios through a process that involved: training in radio production skills and communication for peace, production of new radio content and circulation of the content produced throughout the project. The evaluation aimed to generate evidence about the role of these community radios, especially after the signature of the peace agreements between the Colombian State and the FARC guerilla. The results show the contributions of the Colombian community radios for the construction of a culture of peace and coexistence from the local territories, as well as the transformations, tensions and challenges they faced on the production of new radio content and the construction of spaces for dialogue, participation and collective action." (Abstract)
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"In this study, Yael Warshel assesses Israeli and Palestinian versions of Sesame Street, which targeted negative inter-group attitudes and stereotypes. Merging communication, peace and conflict studies, social psychology, anthropology, political science, education, Middle Eastern and childhood studi
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es, this book provides a template to think about how audiences receive, interpret, use and are influenced by peace communication. By picking apart the text and subtext of the kind of media these specific audiences of children consume, Warshel examines how they interpret peace communication interventions, are socialized into Palestinians, Jewish Israelis and Arab/Palestinian Israelis, the political opinions they express and the violence they reproduce. She questions whether peace communication practices have any relevant structural impact on their audiences, critiques such interventions and offers recommendations for improving future communication interventions into political conflict worldwide." (Publisher description)
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"In the last two decades, amid the global spread of smartphones, state killings of civilians have increasingly been captured on the cameras of both bystanders and police. Screen Shots studies this phenomenon from the vantage point of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. Here, cameras have
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proliferated as political tools in the hands of a broad range of actors and institutions, including Palestinian activists, Israeli soldiers, Jewish settlers, and human rights workers. All trained their lens on Israeli state violence, propelled by a shared dream: that advances in digital photography-closer, sharper, faster-would advance their respective political agendas. Most would be let down. Drawing on ethnographic work, Rebecca L. Stein chronicles Palestinian video-activists seeking justice, Israeli soldiers laboring to perfect the military's image, and Zionist conspiracy theorists accusing Palestinians of "playing dead." Writing against techno-utopianism, Stein investigates what camera dreams and disillusionment across these political divides reveal about the Israeli and Palestinian colonial present, and the shifting terms of power and struggle in the smartphone age." (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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"Fake News, Hate Speech und Rassismus im Netz: Soziale Medien bieten Menschen und Organisationen auch dafür eine Plattform. Wie kann man gegensteuern und selbst aktiv für Demokratie, Meinungsvielfalt und die Entgiftung des gesellschaftlichen Klimas eintreten? Said Rezek, Politikwissenschaftler und
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Journalist, bezieht seit Jahren als Blogger Stellung gegen Rassismus und Hass im Netz. In diesem Buch vermittelt er das Handwerkszeug dazu: Was macht einen reichweitenstarken Blog aus? Zu welchen Themen und Anlässen lohnt sich die Positionierung? Welche Beitragsformen – z.B. Tweets, Memes, Listicles oder Offene Briefe - kann man speziell in Social Media einsetzen? Wie arbeitet man selbst gleichermaßen rechtssicher und kompetent und schützt sich vor Verletzungen der eigenen Privatsphäre? Das Buch bietet zahlreiche praktische Beispiele, wie, wann und wofür es sich zu bloggen lohnt, um Gegnern einer vielfältigen, friedlichen und demokratischen Gesellschaft nicht das Feld zu überlassen." (Buchrücken)
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"In this paper, we investigate to what extent Nigerian newspapers practice peace journalism by emphasizing underlying causes of conflict in their reporting rather than stressing ethnic and religious divisions. We make use of a sequential mixed methods approach, which combines a quantitative content
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analysis of news reports with semi-structured interviews with Nigerian newspaper editors and journalists. Our results indicate that Nigerian newspapers do not explicitly use divisive language when discussing conflicts, but they rarely stress underlying structural causes either. While there is a willingness among Nigerian journalists to avoid potentially escalatory language, a dearth of resources and capacities impedes independent and in-depth analysis concerning the underlying drivers of conflicts." (Abstract)
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"Since the beginning of the 2010s, violence, whether armed or not, has changed and been fuelled in diverse ways on social networks. Journalists need to be more careful and resourceful reporting on it without stirring it up." (Page 1)
"Narratives, both personal and social, guide how we live and how we are acculturated into our social worlds. As we make changes in our lives, our personal stories change and, in turn, have the potential to influence the social narratives of which we are a part. Likewise, when there are changes in th
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e culture and social worlds around us, that social narrative changes, thereby affecting our personal narratives. In other words, personal and social narratives are strongly linked and mutually influence each other. We may feel and know these transformations take place and understand the ways in which our lives are affected. However, we often struggle to document these shifts. This article suggests using the practical theory, Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM) (Pearce, 2007), for narrative analysis to identify and surface personal and social narrative transformations." (Abstract)
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"This study used Twitter advertisements to solicit survey participation from the most-influential members of pro-Ukraine and pro-Russia communities of Twitter users identified in an analysis of 25 million Russian language tweets emanating from Eastern Europe. Survey results suggest that pro-Ukraine
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activists are eager to counter Russian influence. Large percentages of respondents reported using Twitter to help counter Russian influence, and they take this activism to other social media accounts and offline channels, including talking to family members or friends and - to a lesser extent - participating in advocacy groups. At least half of the sample reported being open to receiving additional social media training, and most did not seem opposed to taking this support from the European Union, United States, or Ukraine. However, a hypothetical agreement to receive funding or participate in training does not mean that participants actually would do so. Following a brand ambassador model would help connect influential users with training and content. This model would involve reaching out, building an initial relationship, and establishing trust with these activists. It might be possible to help such users join together to advocate for a unified and democratic Ukraine, increase awareness of particular Russian influence campaigns, disseminate memes or video content addressing media literacy, or identify Russian bots and trolls." (Key findings)
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"The euphoria that has accompanied the birth and expansion of the internet as a "liberation technology" is increasingly eclipsed by an explosion of vitriolic language on a global scale. Digital Hate: The Global Conjuncture of Extreme Speech provides the first distinctly global and interdisciplinary
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perspective on hateful language online. Moving beyond Euro-American allegations of 'fake news,' contributors draw attention to local idioms and practices and explore the profound implications for how community is imagined, enacted, and brutally enforced around the world. With a cross-cultural framework nuanced by ethnography and field-based research, the volume investigates a wide range of cases-from anti-immigrant memes targeted at Bolivians in Chile to trolls serving the ruling AK Party in Turkey - to ask how the potential of extreme speech to talk back to authorities has come under attack by diverse forms of digital hate cultures." (Publisher description)
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