Supporting digital discourse? The deliberative function of links on Twitter

Digital discussion spaces have changed the shape of discursive argumentation considerably. While there is not much explicit reasoning on Twitter, many users link to external resources in their tweets. This study zooms in on the justificatory capacity of those links and investigates their deliberative function on the platform. A qualitative exploration of material from four countries shows that links to external resources support Twitter discourse by regularly substantiating user statements in the context of both information and argumentation. Links with a truth-based informative function are posted to support deliberative truth claims with empirical evidence, thus adding primarily to theoretical discourses. Links with a norm-based argumentative function are shared to legitimate positions against social standards. They contribute to practical discourses about courses of action by sustaining deliberative claims for normative rightness. The country comparison suggests that societal divisions foster a norm-based argumentative rather than truth-based informative use of links on Twitter.

How much reading between the lines is there in online game playing?

This paper discusses to what extent people can convey and understand intentions and messages in Monster Strike, which has only one tool for intentional messaging – called ‘good job’ (GJ) – to send messages to other players, and it is, therefore, interesting to analyze how players exchange ideas and infer each other’s communicative intentions using a limited means of communication towards a common goal. This paper describes the significance of GJ first through an analysis of actual game playing, with supplemental information from players’ discussion spaces on line. The communications encompass (1) the original meaning (i.e., ‘good job’); (2) extended interpretations; and (3) an attention signal, with shared temporary and cumulative knowledge of the game and the players’ own dispositions.

We Should Not Get Rid of Incivility Online

Incivility and toxicity have become concepts du jour in research about social media. The clear normative implication in much of this research is that incivility is bad and should be eliminated. Extensive research—including some that we’ve authored—has been dedicated to finding ways to reduce or eliminate incivility from online discussion spaces. In our work as part of the Civic Signals Initiative, we’ve been thinking carefully about what metrics should be adopted by social media platforms eager to create better spaces for their users. When we tell people about this project, removing incivility from the platforms frequently comes up as a suggested metric. In thinking about incivility, however, we’ve become less convinced that it is desirable, or even possible, for social media platforms to remove all uncivil content. In this short essay, we discuss research on incivility, our rationale for a more complicated normative stance regarding incivility, and what other orientations may be more useful. We conclude with a post mortem arguing that we should not abandon research on incivility altogether, but we should recognize the limitations of a concept that is difficult to universalize.

Free Speech and Safe Spaces: How Moderation Policies Shape Online Discussion Spaces

How do moderation policies affect online discussion? This article analyzes nearly a quarter of a million anonymous comments over a 14-month period from two online Reddit forums matched in topic and size, but with differing moderation policies of “safe space” and “free speech.” I found that in the safe space, moderators removed significantly more comments, and authors deleted their own comments significantly more often as well, suggesting higher rates of self-censorship. Looking only at relatively low frequency posters, I found that language in the safe space is more positive and discussions are more about leisure activities, whereas language in the free speech space is relatively negative and angry, and material personal concerns of work, money, and death are more frequently discussed. Importantly, I found that many of these linguistic differences persisted even in comments by users who were concurrently posting in both subreddits. Altogether, these results suggest that differences in moderation policies may affect self-censorship and language use in online space, implicating moderation policies as key sites of inquiry for scholars of democratic discussion.

Street Discussion Spaces in Post-conflict Côte d’Ivoire: non-formal learning, dialogue and daily life

This paper frames the daily life of education outside of formal school, by considering two types of non-formal discussion spaces in Côte d’Ivoire. I argue that both traditional and modern learning were reinvented in the street in response to the Ivoirian political crisis through the proliferation of spaces called grins and agoras. At daily meetings, teenagers and adults gathered important information regarding the crisis and also learned how to be in a conflicted society, often through dialogic encounters between members of different generations, professions and experiences. In the post-conflict context, these spaces, and the dialogue within them, have evolved to meet the changing needs of participants, further highlighting the connection between learning in everyday life and the surrounding structures and systems.

Fannish discourse communities and the construction of gender in "The X-Files"

Fandoms can constitute discourse communities, where fans make claims about issues of real-world political importance, such as the relationship between gender, power, and autonomy, and where other fans engage with and evaluate those claims. In fan works and fan analyses of Dana Scully in the television show The X-Files, fans pose claims both in discussion spaces and in the creation of fan fiction, and these fannish evaluations and discussions of these fictions analyze those claims.

Blogging for Sovereignty

Blogs addressing political issues are often viewed as highly polarized online discussion spaces. To test the universality of this assumption, the authors evaluated 127 Palestinian blogs written in both Arabic and English languages. Blogs authored by Palestinians living in the Palestinian Territories and the State of Israel, members of the Palestinian Diaspora, and Palestinian advocates of other nationalities were analyzed in terms of the prevalence of political content, perceptions of the State of Israel, and differences in content due to language, nationality, and geographical location. Results of the analysis indicate that blogs in the sample were primarily political and that most blogs were critical of the State of Israel and its policies. The tone of discourse regarding the State of Israel, however, was not as reflexively visceral as one might have anticipated, particularly among blogs written in English and those authored by Palestinian advocates.