[Air-L] PhD plea: Theory Recommendations for On-to-Offline Harassment Research?

[Alette Schoon]

Dear Paula

I did a study of an online gossip network among unemployed young  
people in a low-income black neighbourhood in South Africa, which you  
may find interesting.
http://www-tandfonline-com.ezproxy.uct.ac.za/doi/abs/10.1080/02560046.2012.744723
I initially considered doing a critical discourse analysis of the  
gossip site itself, but I'm glad I chose rather to do qualitative  
interviews with the young people, as I was surprised by the findings.  
Through the interviews I found out mainly young women used the gossip  
site as a type of class-policing, to target other young women who were  
defying class boundaries and 'moving up' - a type of 'tall poppy'  
syndrome. Here an abject female character associated with a stereotype  
of the 'black primitive' was constructed as identity for those who  
'think they're better than us', so perpetuating both race, class and  
gender divisions in a highly fractured society. I would not have  
discovered this from the content of the site.

Good luck with your research.
Alette

Alette Schoon
Senior Lecturer
Television Production
School of Journalism and Media Studies
Rhodes University
South Africa

Quoting Paula Todd <paulatoddmedia at gmail.com>:

> Hi AoIR-ers,
>
>
> With apologies for cross-posting.
>
> Will be very sorry to miss Phoenix this month (Korea was amazing last year)
> but the US dollar is a Canadian nightmare. What a difference a year (and
> oil) makes. Enjoy!
>
> *Query: *I'm researching the effects of negative online role-modelling
>  (including sexist/racists memes, videos and social media) on incidents of
> *offline* harassment. I am looking at adults, particularly women, rather
> than youth digital-schoolyard bullying. I'm inching through Critical
> Discourse Analysis as a theoretical framework, but wonder whether anyone
> imagines a more helpful framework(s). eg. feminist theory. Is there good
> work/research that should be consulted?
>
> New to PhD studies, so any help would be gratefully accepted, and shared
> with permission only.
>
> Best,
> Paula
>
>
> *PAULA TODD, *B.A., LL.B.
> ​,
> PhD Candidate at YorkU​
> Toronto, Ontario, Canada
>
> ​
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