RMeS RMa Course: Contemporary approaches to digital cultures: platforms, politics, performances and people

When? 5 April, 12 April, 26 April, 3 May and 10 May. 13:00-17:00
Where? Erasmus University Rotterdam, Polak 1-20
For? PhD Candidates and RMa Students
Credits? 6 ECTS
Coordination? Dr Payal Arora (Erasmus University Rotterdam – ERMeCC)
Registration

THE SEMINAR IS FULLY BOOKED, please send an e-mail with your name, university and research school to RMeS-fgw@uva.nl. We will put you on our waiting list.

How do we identify the fake from the real? What strategies enable us to reveal and yet protect our subjects who seek anonymity online? Can researchers be activists and their research serve as instruments for social change? How do we ensure fair representation through big data analytics? These are some of the questions that need addressing as we seek to study digital cultures. This course identifies key research issues and novel methodological solutions in the study of contemporary digital cultures. In particular, we investigate challenges faced in the arena of data authenticity, representation and communication to lay and other publics.

The course is organised around four dimensions – platforms, politics, performances and people. Platforms are the new contexts for digital cultures. They are deeply corporatized, walled gardens that often allow a small circle of researchers to access their vast data. They are designed to be unstable, as they need to constantly innovate and re-design to stay competitive. Here, students learn to apply methods of place-making and data hacking to circumvent issues of access and locatedness. To speak thoughtfully about the politics of engagement, students learn to critically identify and capture the perspective from varied actors such as (non)users, programmers, politicians, corporations and activists. To extract voices from below, students learn how to deploy action research using social media campaigns. Performances are about digital expressions, memes and trends. Here, students learn to use digital methods to assess claims of globality and diversity through big data. Lastly, in the module on People, students learn to apply auto-ethnography to digital contexts such as gaming, city navigation and other applications. Overall, this course provides both qualitative and quantitative methodological insights into the examining of contemporary digital cultures.

Aims:

Students have knowledge and understanding of:

• A critical understanding of contemporary digital cultures
• Key methodological problems risen due to the advancement of new technology platforms
• Exposure and critical insight into novel empirical approaches for the digital age
• Diversity in digital cultures and the implications on social equality and representation

Students are able to:

• apply relevant theoretical insights in choosing appropriate methods to analyze digital cultures
• critically reflect on academic texts, both verbal and in written form
• design and write an essay; make an intellectually compelling argument on the choice of methods and identification of challenges in the chosen topic
• present their argument in a clear, convincing and engaging manner

Compulsory literature:

• Readings via RMeS and online resources