Communication Technology and New Media Commons^™

Triple Threat Or Triple Opportunity: When A Pop Culture Course Goes Online At A Community College, Lance Eaton, Alex Rockey

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Teaching popular culture comes with many opportunities and challenges in a traditional classroom, but equally interesting and valuable are the possibilities that teaching such a course online can provide. This article explores how “Popular Culture in the US,” an online course at a community college, embraces some key attributes of the digital world such as multimodal communication and Web 2.0 interactivity. Evolved from a face-to-face community college course, the online version has increasingly developed to move from an instructor-centered to a student-centered approach that relies upon various engagement strategies. By using student choice, OER-enabled pedagogy, and constructivist approaches, the instructor …

Renegade Or Paragon?: Categorizing Narrative Choice In Video Game Storylines, Graham Oliver

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

Choices made during video game gameplay set the stories told in that media apart from other media. Narrative-affecting choices have existed since the earliest games, from character creation in role-playing games to performance-based narrative changes in Metroid to morality-based choices in Ogre Battle. In the contemporary gaming landscape, some games derive a significant portion of their gameplay from character decisions: exploration, dialogue options, quick-time event reactions, etc. In this article, I give a history and breakdown of how choices have existed and evolved in gaming narratives since their inception. I then propose three categories for significant narrative choices: aesthetic, …

Book Review Of Motorsport And Fascism. Living Dangerously. By Paul Baxa. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2022. 313 Pages., Alessio Giovene

Journal of Motorsport Culture & History

No abstract provided.

Book Review Of Lazzaro: A Man And His Machines. By Ron Moshier. Newburyport, Ma: Coastal 101, 2023. 180 Pages., Elton G. Mcgoun

Journal of Motorsport Culture & History

No abstract provided.

A Book Review Of Speed Capital: Indianapolis Auto Racing And The Making Of Modern America. By Brian M Ingrassia. Urbana, Chicago, And Springfield, Il: University Of Illinois Press, 2024., Paul Baxa

Journal of Motorsport Culture & History

No abstract provided.

Euphemism In Ai Discourse As Colonial Harm & Effect: Learnings From Subaltern Puerto Rico, Jacqueline Oquendo

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Through three integrated studies, this dissertation explores complex human-AI interactions by comparing the perceptions of two groups of U.S. citizens: subaltern Puerto Ricans and stateside Americans’ interactions with ChatGPT. This corpus-assisted Critical Discourse Analysis or CLCDA, triangulated with 1:1 semi-structured interviews, validates scholars’ concerns about the biases inherent in generative AI. Contributing to those concerns, this dissertation reveals that ChatGPT deploys discourse strategies that, when executed, facilitate digital colonialism. Euphemistic language is prominent among its discourse strategies, replacing controversial words, phrases, and topics with more palatable ones. When prompted on events of historical significance, I find that ChatGPT’s discourse obscures …

The Psychological Impacts Of Algorithmic And Ai-Driven Social Media On Teenagers: A Call To Action, Sunil Arora, Sahil Arora, John Hastings

Research & Publications

This study investigates the meta-issues surrounding social media, which, while theoretically designed to enhance social interactions and improve our social lives by facilitating the sharing of personal experiences and life events, often results in adverse psychological impacts. Our investigation reveals a paradoxical outcome: rather than fostering closer relationships and improving social lives, the algorithms and structures that underlie social media platforms inadvertently contribute to a profound psychological impact on individuals, influencing them in unforeseen ways. This phenomenon is particularly pronounced among teenagers, who are disproportionately affected by curated online personas, peer pressure to present a perfect digital image, and the …

Female's Digital Self-Making On Tiktok: Identity Construction Through A Framework Of Postfeminist Media And Neoliberalism (2016-2024), Lindsey A. Pritchard

Senior Theses

This thesis explores the relationship between TikTok's algorithmic design, women's identity construction, and the feminist historical context that shapes these constructions. In Chapter 1, "TikTok, Algorithmic Design, and Self-Making," I analyze how TikTok's algorithm functions and how these factors influence the curation and presentation of identity. This chapter establishes the foundational understanding of TikTok as a platform where identity performance is deeply intertwined with algorithmic design.

Chapter 2, "TikTok Feminism and Identity Commodification" examines the commodification of women's identities on the platform. It investigates the historical context of feminism and its evolution into postfeminism, analyzing how these narratives have been …

Bodies For Catastrophe: A Montage Study Of Palestinian Digital Labor, Francisco Ramos

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis investigates Palestinian digital labor through the method of montage. Digital labor, understood as bodily activity transfigured by digital machines into exploitable information, is examined within the context of Israeli surveillance technologies used against Palestinians. The study critically explores the dual political functions of these technologies: as tools of settler-colonial domination aiming to dispossess Palestinians, and as neoliberal mechanisms seeking to profit from the surveillance of Palestinian bodies. The second half of the thesis turns to the ways Palestinians engage with such technologies and unsettle the economic and colonial logics embedded in them.

The research is structured nonlinearly using …

Praying To Tiktok, Seeking The Self: How Rhetoric Reveals And Conceals The World’S Most Powerful Guru Of The Postindustrial Age, Samantha L. Gillespie-Hoffman

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Imagine a world where the most powerful leader is a wellness guru that runs an elaborate church with millions of followers. The guru is so powerful that everyone believes they can read minds and make ordinary people rich and famous. The guru controls forms of communication, media channels, consumer tastes, and what people eat, drink, say, and even think. What if this guru was not human but actually an algorithm? Does this sound like the plot of a science fiction novel? I argue that this scenario is closer to reality than most will admit. In this project, readers encounter a …

The Blessed Assembly: Irreplaceable Physical Co-Presence In Worship And Healthy Hybridity Reimagined After The Pandemic In The Digital Age, Yvette, Ying Wai Lau

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

Because of the unprecedented and unexpected force of the pandemic since 2020, most churches around the world have experienced some online worship during the lockdown of their cities or the mandated closure of the church buildings. For many people, online worship seems to be an equivalent, if not better, alternative for gathering together—a physical co-presence in worship—even after the pandemic has ended. As necessary and vital as online worship experiences have been for Christians during the pandemic, the witness of the church from Pentecost throughout Christian history indicates that gathered worship in physical spaces is irreplaceable for faith formation and …

Exploring Gen Z’S Identity Formation And Its Influence On Consumption Of Pop Culture And Entertainment Merchandise, Melisa Annette Spilinek

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Fandoms have grown in size and influence, becoming a complex and dynamic cultural phenomenon that richly impacts the consumption of media and consumer behavior. The capitalistic United States with its diverse and media-savvy population, is a prime destination to study fan studies, particularly among young adults who are a crucial component of fandom influence.

The internet has grown to be a major component of the fan experience, an integral part of fandom culture. Online communities provide avenues for Generation Z to connect with others who share similar struggles, challenges, and interests, highlighting the importance of digital platofrms on the evolution …

Artificial Sociality, Simone Natale, Iliana Depounti

Human-Machine Communication

This article proposes the notion of Artificial Sociality to describe communicative AI technologies that create the impression of social behavior. Existing tools that activate Artificial Sociality include, among others, Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT, voice assistants, virtual influencers, socialbots and companion chatbots such as Replika. The article highlights three key issues that are likely to shape present and future debates about these technologies, as well as design practices and regulation efforts: the modelling of human sociality that foregrounds it, the problem of deception and the issue of control from the part of the users. Ethical, social and cultural …

A New Family Member Or Just Another Digital Interface? Smart Speakers In The Lives Of Families With Young Children, Giovanna Mascheroni

Human-Machine Communication

Based on longitudinal qualitative research involving twenty families with at least one child aged eight or younger, the article provides an account of how families, as distinctive communicative figurations, adopt, use and make sense of smart speakers through diverse socially situated practices. Findings show that parents and children enter in a communicative relationship with smart speakers based on their attribution of human-like or machine-like traits to the device, and the device response to their expectations. Moreover, engaging in communicative practices through and with smart speakers, family members subvert or reinforce existing power relations. However, smart speakers acquire new agency by …

Healing A Generation; Implementation Of Higher Education Curricula For Venezuelan Journalism Students Living Under Structural Violence To Promote A Transition Into Democracy, José Luis Jiménez-Figarotti Prof.

The SUNY Journal of the Scholarship of Engagement: JoSE

Venezuela's sociopolitical landscape has deteriorated significantly over the past decade, culminating in a profound humanitarian crisis. This ethnography, conducted from 2015 to the present, explores the experiences of a study group comprising 2000 Venezuelan communication college students, aged 17 to 25, who navigate structural violence while striving for quality higher education. The research employed a multifaceted approach, encompassing interviews, focus groups, and observations. Additionally, this qualitative study examines the outcomes of implementing an interdisciplinary journalism curriculum grounded in human rights and media activism, complemented by online sessions and an environmental education component. This educational project aims to foster critical thinking …

U.S. Government Agency Podcasts, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Presents podcasts from U.S. Government agencies which can be discovered through the U.S. Government Publishing Office's Catalog of Government Publications. Agencies whose podcasts are presented include the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Peace Corps, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Government Accountability Office (GAO), National Park Service, Department of Justice, Federal Reserve System, and U.S. Naval War College.

An Examination Of How The Media Portrayed Professional Female Athletes During The 2023 Women's World Cup In The Match-Up Between Spain And The United States, Brianna R. Breazier

College of Journalism and Mass Communications: Professional Projects

This project is an examination of how the media portrayed professional female athletes during the 2023 Woen's World Cup in the match-up between Spain and the United States. This project consists of a literature review of the history of both countries, an overview of feminist theory, and past studies that show current patterns of biases or stereotypical behavior in today’s mainstream media. This project also consists of a cross-examination and comparison between Spain and the United States, specifically examining the timeline of events between the two. The purpose of this study is to compare the media trends of professional female …

When The Opposition Dominates The Conversation (Twitter Network Analysis About The Controversial Indonesian Constitutional Court Decision), Rifki Nur Priyansyah, Rudi Reynal Sulaiman, Ferdi Raihan Firdaus

JURNAL KOMUNIKASI INDONESIA

The Constitutional Court of Indonesia decided to grant a request of the Deputy Chairman of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to extend the term of office of the KPK from 4 years to 5 years. This brought up public attention on Twitter, including members of the House of Representatives (DPR). Social network analysis was used to discover how the discussion appeared on the Twitter network and the actors involved (using indegree, outdegree, and betweenness centrality derived from graph theory). The Netlytic program recorded 6,195 uploads from May 25, 2023, to June 1, 2023. the Gephi application detects 3377 nodes and …

Design And Test The Effectiveness Of Interpretive Signs Using Eye Tracking And Biometric Data, Hadara Gordon, Wendy Miyazaki

Baker/Koob Endowments Awarded Projects

Recreational trails on forested lands should satisfy the needs of recreationists, safeguard important habitats, and maintain the natural environment (Kortenkamp et al., 2021). Appropriate management is critical because of the increasing number of visitors. Signs are a cost-effective method to reduce the negative impacts on visitors and enhance visitor experiences (Brown et al., 2010). This research aimed to investigate how visitors pay attention to signs, view the trail surrounded by trees and behave in a natural space.

Embodied Action In Remote Online Interaction: A Preliminary Investigation Of Hand Raising Gestures In A Zoom Meeting, Angela Garcia

Natural & Applied Sciences Faculty Publications

In this paper I use a conversation analytic approach to investigate how participants in a meeting held remotely via Zoom use embodied action to solicit selection as next speaker. When hand raising is not immediately successful, participants use embodied actions to withdraw, modify, upgrade, downgrade or reissue gestures in pursuit of selection as next speaker. Due to the technological affordances and limitations of the remote meeting environment, participants’ gestures and hand positions differ from what would typically occur in face-to-face interaction, resulting in frequent gestures near the face that provide for both visibility to the Zoom audience and easy transition …

Cyberbullying During Covid-19 Pandemic: Relation To Perceived Social Isolation Among College And University Students, Nadya Stefani Neuhaeusler

International Journal of Cybersecurity Intelligence & Cybercrime

One tell-tale sign of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is the heavy reliance on electronic devices. Young adults in particular have indicated a greater presence on social media and high levels of loneliness during the pandemic. This trend has raised concerns about increased feelings of social isolation and reliance on technology, which could lead to more internet or computer crimes—including cyberbullying. Despite a growing body of literature, little is known about the association between cyberbullying victimization and social isolation among young adults— with even less known about this phenomenon in the context of the ongoing pandemic. Drawing on survey …

Trust Me: Film + Q&A; (February 22, 2024, 5:30 Pm, Sheldon Museum Of Art) [Poster], Sheldon Museum Of Art, University Of Nebraska-Lincoln

Sheldon Museum of Art: Catalogs and Publications

Poster for Trust Me: Film + Q&A held February 22, 2024 at 5:30 PM at the Sheldon Museum of Art (University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States).

Poster blurb:

In today's information landscape, how do you know whom--and what--you can trust? Watch the award-winning, feature-length documentary Trust Me, which explores how media technology is influencing society and what we can do about it.

A Q&A with Rosemary Smith, filmmaker and managing director of the non-partisan Getting Better Foundation, follows.

More information about the screening is available at https://news.unl.edu/newsrooms/today/article/trust-me-documentary-to-screen-at-sheldon/.

More information about the film is available at https://www.trustmedocumentary.com/ …

Algorithmic Love: Twenty-First Century Organizations Of The Romantic, Sandra Moyano Ariza

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation investigates the highly computed and accelerated experiences of digital love as well as their cultural and artistic representations in order to shed light on the human and more-than-human entanglements producing the algorithmic love experience. The recent turn to love in critical theory and cultural studies examines how love circulates in neoliberal societies and in the subjective processes of the users, foregrounding the control of populations and the very much lamented “end of love” (Illouz 2019). My study of love supplements the neoliberalist critique of algorithmic love with a posthuman and media theory approach that attends to the material …

What Does One Billion Dollars Look Like?: Visualizing Extreme Wealth, William Mahoney Luckman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The word “billion” is a mathematical abstraction related to “big,” but it is difficult to understand the vast difference in value between one million and one billion; even harder to understand the vast difference in purchasing power between one billion dollars, and the average U.S. yearly income. Perhaps most difficult to conceive of is what that purchasing power and huge mass of capital translates to in terms of power. This project blends design, text, facts, and figures into an interactive narrative website that helps the user better understand their position in relation to extreme wealth: https://whatdoesonebilliondollarslooklike.website/

The site incorporates …

The Role Of Social Media In Raising Awareness Against Green Crimes : An Applied Study On Naif University Students, Munahi Bin Shari

Journal of Police and Legal Sciences

Social media platforms are considered among the most important modern tools for raising awareness against green crimes in the Arab world. These platforms have a significant impact on environmental awareness and the advancement of the nation through education and guidance. They play a vital role in influencing various segments of society and drawing attention to various environmental issues. This research aims to explore the role of social media in raising awareness against green crimes.

To achieve these objectives, the researcher employed a descriptive survey methodology and conducted a questionnaire survey among a sample of 591 students at Naif University in …

Digital Phobia: An Inquiry For Mapping The Unseen Dimension Of New Digital Anxiety, The ‘Digiphobia’, Amarjit Kumar Singh ,Library Assistant, Md. Arshad Ali , Professional Assistant, Dr. Pankaj Mathur, Deputy Librarian,

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Background: As technology continues to advance, individuals' interactions with digital platforms have become integral to daily life. Amidst this technological evolution, a novel concern emerges—Digital Phobia, hereafter referred to as “Digiphobia.” This phenomenon, although not previously explored in scholarly literature, necessitates an in-depth investigation due to its potential impact on individuals' well-being. Our research employs a two-step methodology to investigate its existence, implications, and manifestations.

Introduction: This research paper introduces and proposes the term "Digiphobia" as a comprehensive conceptualization of anxiety arising from interactions with digital spaces, applications, and environments. The proliferation of digital technologies has led to the emergence …

Technical Temporalities Of The Transitional Protest Movements, Talha C. Issevenler

Publications and Research

The concept of political time is unpacked through an analysis of the interactive, technologically mediated field between the state and social movements. The activities of protest movements are set in dialogue with state reason in order to theorize the temporality of political rationality as entangled with political affects (i.e., attachments to past political ideals and unmetabolized/unsymbolized technological propensities).

U.S. Online Romance Scams: A Mixed Methods Analysis Of Factors Associated With Victimization And Exploration Of Lived Experiences Of Victimization, Rebecca A. Cole

Social Work Dissertations - Archive

The objective of this dissertation is to understand develop an understanding of experiences of online romance scam¹(ORS) victimization and to examine factors associated with ORS victimization. The dissertation samples ORS victims and uses purposive sampling strategies to recruit participants. The research used a mixed methods explanatory design approach. Inclusion criteria included ORS victims 18 and older who lived in the U.S., lost any amount of money in ORS scam, and met the scammer on any Internet platform. Three research manuscripts complete this dissertation. The first manuscript is a scoping review to understand the mental and physical health outcomes …

Identifying Youth Appeals In Alcohol Alternative Social Media Content Through Framing, Melina Oneal

West Chester University Master’s Theses

Proposed regulations for alcohol advertising prevent beverage companies from targeting people under the legal drinking age. However, similar regulations for alcohol alternative beverages are less explored, which could allow alcohol alternative products to create awareness for alcoholic beverages among youth. Alcohol alternatives beverages, including no-alcohol and low-alcohol products, are increasing in popularity and can function as compliments to alcoholic products to decrease the total alcohol volume consumed or as substitutes for alcoholic products. Framing theory can be operationalized through the Content Appealing to Youth Index, an index of content elements found in research literature to be appealing to youth, to …

Autopathography Across Media: Trauma And Fluid Embodied Subjectivity, He (Kristen) Shen

Honors Theses

Illness memoirs with first-person point of view have gained more attention in recent years among medical sociologists and anthropologists. Different from traditional “case histories”written by doctors that are in danger of ignoring patients’ voices, autopathograhical works delineate narrators’ transformative experiences of persons to patients, emphasizing the importance of gaining social understanding of illness. Focusing on three works within the category of autopathography across genres and media forms in the late 1950s and contemporary periods, The Cancer Journals (1980) written by Audre Lorde, The Collected Schizophrenias (2019) written by Esmé Weijun Wang, and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007) directed …