[Air-L] Join us for the Digimethods 2023: Africa Digital Methods Winter School

[Alette Schoon]

Join us for the Digimethods 2023: Africa Digital Methods Winter School at
Rhodes University in South Africa

19-22 June 2023



We invite digital media researchers and  postgraduate students to attend a
digital methods winter school that will explore topics in the field of
Media and Journalism Studies related to the study of digital media, social
media and mobile apps. Whether you are a seasoned digital researcher or a
total novice, or primarily a qualitative researcher looking to expand your
repertoire of methods, this Winter School is for you.



The four-day winter school in Makhanda from 19-22 June 2023 will be an
immersive experience starting off with a series of masterclasses that will
ready participants to take part in small research teams. On the first day
we kick off the winter school by exploring a range of tools. Participants
will learn methods for scraping, visualising and analysing online textual
and visual data and then apply these towards answering  actual research
questions over the final three days of the winter school. They will tackle
uniquely African research questions related to digital and social media and
participate in a carefully choreographed research scrum that will result in
a range of original findings.



Currently topics of interest being developed include:


   -

   Textual analysis tools for exploring African News websites
   -

   Social media and network analysis
   -

   Tools for exploring mobile apps
   -

   Visual analysis of social media
   -

   Machine learning


We have already signed up the following speakers to share their extensive
experience in the field:


   -

   Dr Dani Madrid-Morales, Sheffield University (Content analysis tools
   using R-Studio)
   -

   Dr Dennis Nguyen, Utrecht University (Data Bias & online content
   analysis)
   -

   Dr Henri-Count Evans, University of eSwatini (Social Network Analysis)
   -

   Prof Adam Peruta, Syracuse University (Understanding mobile apps)
   -

   Mr Jean le Roux, DFR Lab (Misinformation Online)


 And online presentations by:

   -

   Prof Anne Helmond, University of Utrecht (Mobile App Methods)
   -

   Dr Ranjit Singh, Data & Society  (AI research agenda for the majority
   world)


We will aim towards:

   -

   Showing how certain digital methods lend themselves to specific research
   questions
   -

   Sharing approaches for developing relevant research questions that can
   be researched through digital methods.
   -

   Developing appropriate research questions related to African cultural
   phenomena, working within specific topics relevant to digital media on the
   continent.
   -

   Getting participants to sign up for a small research team in which they
   will generate local research questions, scrape, visualise and analyse data.
   -

   Furthermore, we will also showcase research methods developed on the
   continent.
   -

   We will develop all of this into a handbook for digital methods for the
   Global South as well as a MOOC.



We are looking to compile a sense of interest in the winter school as well
as ideas for local collaborators and possible topics for research through
such digital methods. Any enquiries should be directed at Alette Schoon on
a.schoon at ru.ac.za.

We invite you to fill in this Google Form to indicate your interest in the
Winter School: https://forms.gle/vCTKT3EsKG4PgJzh8

The Winter School will be directly followed by a colloquium for journalism
and media educators, who are invited to submit a proposal at the following
link: https://forms.gle/YjFjBwxykE2vFZjAA.

--