Presentation at BCMCR Research Seminar 18 Feb 2015
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This presentation discusses the researcher's study of how creative and cultural workers use social media. The researcher aims to provide insight into social media's role in these workers' everyday lives and how they perform expertise online. The researcher plans to interview 15-20 creative professionals, have them keep a diary of social media use, and analyze social media posts. Previous literature explored includes performance and identity on social media, cultural work, and how social media relates to precarity and intermediaries in the creative industries.
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Presentation at BCMCR Research Seminar 18 Feb 2015
- 1. The social media use of creative and cultural workers Karen Patel
- 2. This presentation • My research – questions, scope, literature, method • The ‘N’ word • Performance of expertise
- 3. Questions • What is the role of social media use in the everyday lives of creative and cultural workers? • How is expertise performed on social media? • What can these insights tell us about the culture of the creative industries?
- 4. Aims • Provide an insight into how creative and cultural workers use social media and the role it plays in their everyday lives • Relate these insights to the wider context of the creative industries and contribute to knowledge about creative work • Contribute to social media methods and knowledge about ethical concerns in social media research • Add to current knowledge about expertise in the creative industries
- 5. Why? • The working conditions of people employed in the ‘creative industries’ as an ongoing area of debate in creative industries/cultural policy scholarship, issues such as precarity and labour (McRobbie, 2002; Hesmondalgh and Pratt, 2005; Oakley, 2011) • Similar debates about social media use in terms of identity, privacy, digital labour (Gregg 2014; Fuchs 2015) and exploitation of users by corporations (Andrejevic 2012; Arvidsson and Colleoni, 2012)
- 6. Literature Performance and Identity Social media Cultural work Performance, performativity Creative and cultural workers’ identity Online identity Self branding and experts on social media Social media and performance Social media, creative industries, labour Policy context Cultural Political Economy Precarity, expertise, intermediaries
- 7. Scope and potential methods • Birmingham as case study city • Around 15-20 interviews • Diary of social media use • Relational discourse analysis (Fairclough, 2003) of social media posts • Pilot study with artist
- 8. “The continuance of certain neoliberal logics is apparent in which markets are used to organise almost everything, including expertise. This introduced new forms of expert relations and interests, such as the pursuit of value and profit, to the work of cultural organisations.” (Prince, 2014:12) Neoliberalism
- 9. Performance of expertise Literature Performativity – Butler, Michel Callon (1998) Performance – Goffman (1959) Nixon (2014) – cultural intermediaries (Callon and Bourdieu)
- 10. Performance of expertise Used with permission from Rachel Marsden • Fairclough’s relational discourse analysis (2003) • Language of the expert, authoritative, presenting information • Association – people and companies associated with • Cover (2012) identifies identity ‘performances’ occurring through association and tagging
- 11. Initial observations • Hashtags • The self - back to the ‘N’ word • Role in practice
- 12. Thank You
Editor's Notes
- Explain what relational discourse analysis is – used by Fairclough to look at expertise and identity of politicians. Why Birmingham?
- From my own experience as a practitioner in Birmingham’s creative industries, social media is an important tool. Performativity concerned with signifying and enacting through words (Butler). Callon applied this to performativity of the economy, in that economic discourses and devices help to frame economic behaviour. Callon’s approach can be useful for looking at performativity within the economy, and Nixon utilised elements of this with Bourdieu’s approach to social formation, taste and class dispositions (HOW) in looking at cultural intermediaries, who are considered ‘experts’ in their field. Such approaches useful for situating my findings within the wider context of the cultural and creative industries, economy and markets (neoliberalism) which is also where I’m looking at cultural political economy. Goffman’s approach to performance has been applied when looking at self presentation online, Goffman claims that the user is actively aware of the audience when presenting themselves Linkages also between performativity and identity through work of du Gay, especially his critique of Butler’s performative agency and the work of Callon in approaches to personhood (define what personhood is) All of these approaches could be of value to my work.
- Explain this person is a pilot study Brief analysis here using aspects of relational discourse analysis Fairclough points out how expertise is increasingly broadcasted through mediated communication and mass media. I’m looking to treat social media as a form of this mediated communication. Fairclough’s relational discourse analysis used to look at experts and the language of the expert – authoritative, presenting information. Also important to take into account practice (e.g. Prince’s practices of assemblage?) and associations (boyd and Heer, Fairclough mentions it also. Use of words such as ‘specialist’. Description of what she does and her associations. However, not quite the information giving, authoriatitiveness which Fairclough talks about. Emphasis on her personal development and journey as a practitioner and academic. Self-branding through hashtag - #wordgirl a hashtag she regularly uses. Identity. #PhD also there. Cover (2012) claims that identity ‘performances’ occur through associations and tagging, yet this can sometimes be at odds with stable identity narrative
- Hashtags used in a form of self branding, categorising? #PhD and #wordgirl Medium specific conventions such as hashtags in Twitter, what about conventions for other platforms? Finding out more about the role of this requires mixed method approach including diary and interviews.