This document provides background information on analyzing Twitter discussion events using multimodal discourse analysis. It discusses how hashtags and other elements on Twitter can facilitate information sharing and the formation of online communities. While metrics and large datasets can provide insights, some researchers argue that "data" fails to fully capture qualitative aspects like conversations and social contexts. The dynamics of professional identity and community formation online warrant further study.

1. searching for the material of
Twitter discussion events
Open online
spaces of
learning

2. Overview
Background to the study
The research site
Pattern seeking data
Where it s leading

3. Background
How is professional identity
negotiated and performed?
What are the dynamics of
professional community formation?

4. Background
Mul$modal/
mediated
discourse
analysis
ac$on
occurs
in
nexus
of
words,
objects,
histories
and
storyline
Image
from
Paul
Randall,
2009
Norris
&
Jones
2005;
Halliday
1994;
Fairclough
2003;
Roger
2011;
Baym
2009

5. Background
Tweets
Replies
User Mentions
Retweets
Hashtags
platforms (Purohit et al
(2013) supporting emergence
of coherence between Tweets &
generation of conversational
structure

6. Background
… to co-create a fluid and dynamic
structure within the tweet timeline that
facilitates information discovery: anyone
searching for the hashtag can see what
everyone else is saying about this topic
(Procter, Vis & Voss 2013: 198).
#

7. What
are
the
dynamics
of
professional
community
forma$on
Image
from
Brad
Ovenell-­‐Carter
at
hSps://flic.kr/p/ccGhuh

8. What
are
the
dynamics
of
professional
community
forma$on

11. General Statistics

12. Key metrics (Bruns & Steiglitz 2013)

13. Temporal

16. Word frequencies

20. Who knows why people do what they do? The point is
they do it, and we can track and measure it with
unprecedented fidelity. With enough data, the numbers
speak for themselves.
Chris Anderson, Wired in Williamson 2014
But …

21. But …
As a research term, ‘data’ has been a problem for
qualitative researchers for some decades now,
not least because the term is — in most common
usage — associated with some thing that one
gathers, hence is a priori and collectable. Data
are potentially informational, yes, but as
operationalized in most of the social or natural
sciences, function fundamentally as discrete
objects that can be located in time and space.
The problem with this conceptualization is that it
remains categorically different from — and in a
sense opposed to — the very idea of process.
From a qualitative perspective, ‘data’ poorly
capture the sensation of a conversation or a
moment in context.
(Markham 2013: 1)

22. and …

23. References
Baym, N.K. (2009). A Call for Groundingi the Face of Blurred Boudaries. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication. 14: 720-723
Halliday, M.A.K. (1994). Introduction to Functional Grammar. London: Arnold
Introna, L.D. (2007). Towards a post-human intra-actional account of socio-technical ahency
(and morality). Prepared for the Moral Agency and Technical Artefacts. Scientific Workshop –
NIAS Hague, 10-12 May.
Markham, A. N. (2013). Undermining data : A critical examination of a core term in scientific
inquiry. First Monday. 18 (10).
Markham, A.N. and Lindgren, S. (2012). From Object to Flow: Network sensibility, symbolic
interactionism and social media. Studies in Symbolic Interaction
Norris, S. and Jones, R.H. (2005). Discourse in action: introducing mediated discourse analysis.
London: Routledge
Roger, R. (ed). (2011). An introduction to critical discourse analysis in education. 2nd edition.
London: Sage
Thurlow, Crispin. and Mroczek, Kristine. (2011). Digital discourse: language in the new media.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
Van Leeuwen, Theo. (2008). Discourse & Practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Williamson, B. 2014. The death of the theorist and the emergence of data and algorithms in
digital social research. LSE Impact of Social Sciences, 10 February 2014: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/
impactofsocialsciences/2014/02/10/the-death-of-the-theorist-in-digital-social-research/