Doing Race Online: Essays on Race-Making on Social Media Platforms
2022-05
Loading...
View/Download File
Persistent link to this item
Statistics
View StatisticsJournal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Title
Doing Race Online: Essays on Race-Making on Social Media Platforms
Authors
Published Date
2022-05
Publisher
Type
Thesis or Dissertation
Abstract
Race —a socially constructed concept that marks perceived differences in phenotype —is an active process. Race is not something that people have or are, but instead is a set of actions that are done every day by individuals and institutions. Examples include segregating jail facilities based on an imprecise racial identification system or choosing hairstyles based on their perceived racial meaning. Scholars refer to these practices as “doing race” or “race-making,” terms that signal the active social interactions that(re)produce the meanings ascribed to racial categories. The newest, and perhaps most significant, context for “doing race” is on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Social media platforms, particularly Twitter, have provided a space for Black users to build digital communities to contest and construct ideas about Blackness in the U.S. These platforms also provide a space for the companies that operate them to enact their beliefs about race through algorithmic design and content policies. As such, an examination of the doing of race online expands our theoretical and empirical understanding of race relations in the U.S. In my mixed-methods dissertation, I examine how platforms and Black users construct and contest the meanings of racial categories online and what those meanings reveal about race relations in the contemporary U.S. In the three essays that follow, I examine three theoretical and empirical questions, respectively: (1) In posts about race and racism on social media, how do Black users do race, construct Blackness, and contest oppressive structures? (2) How do social media platforms frame the problem of racism in the U.S, and what does this reveal about the online spaces in which conversations about race and racism occur? (3) What does "algorithmic bias" miss and is there a more substantive framework to describe systemic inequalities in the digital sphere?
Keywords
Description
University of Minnesota Ph.D. dissertation. May 2022. Major: Sociology. Advisors: Joyce Bell, Michael Walker. 1 computer file (PDF); v, 154 pages.
Related to
Replaces
License
Collections
Series/Report Number
Funding information
Isbn identifier
Doi identifier
Previously Published Citation
Suggested citation
Hamilton, Amber. (2022). Doing Race Online: Essays on Race-Making on Social Media Platforms. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/260121.
Content distributed via the University Digital Conservancy may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor. By using these files, users agree to the Terms of Use. Materials in the UDC may contain content that is disturbing and/or harmful. For more information, please see our statement on harmful content in digital repositories.