"This book presents a new paradigm for attending to gender-based violence (GBV) social media discourse among marginalised black women in South Africa. Focusing on the intersections of television and social media, the study charts the morphing and merging of the "inside" of the soap opera and the "ou
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tside" of the real world, amid a rise in feminist social media activism. The analysis begins with coverage of gender-based violence in a long-running South African soap opera and social media discussion of these issues, in parallel with real world events and the collective social media response. The author offers pertinent insights into audiences in sub-Saharan Africa, presenting a new feminist trajectory for women and activism in the region." (Publisher description)
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"This paper presents an exploratory study aimed at systematically mapping the public actions taken by OSCE participating States to combat online violence against female journalists. Adopting a qualitative large N research design, the study examines national policies and initiatives across all 57 OSC
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E participating States. Through extensive desk research of official government documents and gray literature qualitative data is collected. The analysis thereof is guided by three research aims: (a) identifying actions implemented by participating states, (b) examining the roles of public sphere actors, and (c) assessing the approaches adopted to combat online violence. The paper discusses best practices identified in eleven OSCE participating States, shedding light on strategies for addressing online violence against female journalists. However, the findings highlight significant disparities in policy implementation and acknowledgment of the issue, with only a minority of states demonstrating proactive measures on the safety of journalists (11 states; 19.3%). Of these 11 States, only 7 participating States (12.28%) were found to have a gendered approach. 47 (80.7%) participating States lack information and/or targeted action on violence against journalists. Challenges including the legal gray area surrounding online violence, limited response from tech platforms, and the complexities of transnational collaboration are discussed. Finally, based on these insights, policy recommendations are proposed to enhance to address the multifaceted challenges more effectively. These include working towards multinational definitions and approaches on online gender-based violence against journalists, and developing international multi stakeholder cooperation and peer education." (Abstract)
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"At the heart of decolonial theory is the love for woman, particularly black woman, as the most oppressed of political categories in the old colonial structures of race, class and gender hierarchy. This chapter uses decolonial theory, specifically Chela Sandoval’s concept of ‘decolonial love’
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as a political technology, to discuss the cyberbullying of women journalists in South Africa. It blends Sandoval’s decolonial love theory with Frantz Fanon’s concept of ‘damnes’ or ‘wretched of the earth,’ to analyse stories of cyber-bullying, sexism and threats of sexual violence against women journalists using the research published in Glass Ceilings: Women in South African Media Houses 2018. This chapter argues that it is a revolutionary oppositional consciousness that operates when women, particularly black women, continue in the performativity of their craft to write and to speak out in the media, despite the subjection and misogyny they face." (Abstract)
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"This report presents the results of deep dive experiments into the risks associated to the design, deployment and use of generative AI to facilitate gender-based violence. It assesses the possible impact posed by generative AI that enables the creation of more realistic ‘synthetic’ media, ‘ha
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llucinations’ or biases in the outputs, automated harassment campaigns, and the ability to build ‘synthetic histories’ and compositional deepfakes. Lessons learned from the prompt-injection experiments conducted on how gender-based cyber-harassment templates are and can be generated are presented. It concludes with measures to be put in place by generative AI companies and the technology companies that platform them, by regulators and policy makers, by civil society organisations and independent researchers, as well as users." (Back cover)
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