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Asking (new) media questions: Thinking beyond the Twitter revolution
- Source: Explorations in Media Ecology, Volume 13, Issue 3-4, Dec 2014, p. 269 - 283
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- 01 Dec 2014
Abstract
This article argues for a turn to more post-structuralist approaches to new media studies. By reviewing the existing literature on the role of new media in social movements, I contend that binaristic frames are still constraining new media studies. After elaborating upon the scholarship dealing with the use of Twitter in social movements like the Arab Spring, I examine how a turn to more post-structuralist approaches can aid in understanding new media within a complex system. Although the post-structuralist turn in communication is largely responsible for opening up the space that new media studies now inhabit, post-structuralism is largely abandoned upon entering this terrain. This piece calls for a return to post-structuralist methods to trace the role of new media across platforms using scholars such as Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari and Bruno Latour.