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Annotated Bibliography Genevieve Bates Michael Audette-Longo FYSM 1217A Sound, Media and Culture

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Annotated Bibliography

Since its development, social media has become a new phenomenon in the world of political elections. New media has played a major role in the progression of political campaigning and continues to revolutionize the way elections are held. This paper will examine the relationship between social media and political participation as well as the effectiveness of social networking in election campaigns. Social media is a powerful political campaigning tool resulting in increased participation among a significantly larger sphere then ever before. It has become a source of political expression, ultimately improving a campaigns reach and interaction with supporters. To prove this thesis, I extract from various scholarly articles discussing the link between social media and the participation of citizens in political elections. The article The Internet Electorate written by R. Kelly Garrett and James N. Danziger reports on a national telephone survey they conducted in which demonstrates how American citizens experience elections and how their exposure and involvement has changed as a result of new media and networking. In the lead up to the 2008 U.S election, the survey showed that roughly two-thirds of Americans accessed campaign news online, a dramatic increase from 2004. In addition, nearly two-thirds of respondents expressed seeking campaign news from online sources as opposed to television, the radio or newspapers almost every day. Americans relied on the Internet as a source of information, from websites to social networking where friends and family share news regarding the campaigns. The article also discusses the Internet as a platform for

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY expression for politicians and candidates, varying from direct massages to viral videos. Garrett and Danziger also found from the survey that most citizens depend on content from mainstream outlets rather then partisan alternatives as well as information from friends and family. This dependence on informal sources can prove to be disruptive of original and factual content as this pattern of information sharing is most commonly selective and therefore is often classified as opinion research (Garrett and Danziger, 2011). Garrett and Danziger conclude from their investigation that the Internet as a political campaign tool has significant connection to the participation of voters in elections. The Facebook Election: New Media and The 2008 Election Campaign focuses specifically on Online Social-Interactive Media including social networking sites and blogs, video-sharing sites and online discussion forums (Johnson and Perlmutter, 2010). The article examines how this use of media changed the ways in which candidates campaigned. In Facebook groups in particular, groups related to the 2008 election were found to be dominated by discussions pertaining to the campaigns and their issues rather then social interaction proving the potential of social networking sites being a valuable and effective domain for fostering civic engagement among young voters (Johnson and Perlmutter, 2010). The benefits of online social- interactive media are also explored in terms of its potential to lower political cynicism due to its interpersonal nature. Johnson and Perlmutter propose that the introduction of new communication technologies have fundamentally changed the nature of political debates. To demonstrate this assumption, they call attention to the shift in organization and control of political campaigns. The control that candidates once had over content was very centralized and there were very

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY few players in the distribution of content but due to new media, the sharing of content is

much more universal. Anyone can post a comment, false or factual, or a misleading photo on a Facebook page or create a video or a blog and regardless if the content is authentic or not, thousands of people are observing and taking in the subject matter. Conclusively, as a result of this candidates no longer have complete control over their message. The article Live Research: Twittering an Election Debate by Greg Elmer analyzes twitter as a micro blogging platform that collapses information into a certain time frame maintaining a concise focus on only immediate and relevant information or tweets. Twitter is a trimmed down hyper active blog interface composed of bursts of text (Elmer, 2012). Consequently, only a select array of posts maintains a focus across the audience. This article attempts to understand the techniques used in political campaigns in expanding readership of their posts across the twitter sphere during a live broadcast political debate. Elmer argues that the development of hyper- immediate, timecompressed social media interfaces (Elmer, 2012), such as twitter allow for socially mediated and commentated conversation on live broadcasted events, such as, in this case political debates. To demonstrate this correlation, Elmer uses an example in which a collaboration with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Ryersons Infoscape Lab during the 2008 Canadian federal election takes place, which focuses on the execution of political tweets posted during a live CBC broadcast of the debate. The collaboration demonstrates the influence of a tech-savvy political dynamic. As a result of this collaboration it was determined that real time media is of growing importance and influence in both the social and political sphere of the social networked society that we live in today.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY The Role of Digital Media is an article that assesses social media as a tool that can be utilized by civil society and as an informant for social activists, specifically involved

in the Arab Spring in this article. New media has provided Arab communities with anti dictatorship strategies and the availability of trusted networks, not supervised by the state and has also enabled social movements. Howard and Hussain discuss the success of social media in the mobilization of social protests against unjust rule. They explore Facebook as a useful tool used in the initial stages of protest and the broad reach of text messages, which allowed for crucial information to be circulated among citizens. Media was also used as a tool to provide the international media with pictures of the events that were taking place. This analysis displays social media as mechanism of social change and development in the world of politics. Finally, the article Politics, Elections and Online Campaigning: Past, Presentand a Peek into the Future analyzes mass media and its popularity amongst politicians and candidates as well as its effectiveness in allowing their connection and engagement with citizens and potential voters. Media has allowed for increased visibility and interaction among candidates and their voters. The article draws attention to the television as a more popular and favoured source over the Internet, although not significantly more then the Internet, it does remain the dominant source of campaign news amongst citizens. The article contains a variety of theoretical viewpoints and frameworks consisting of research and methods uses to examine the area of the Internet and the promotion of political action in different regions of the world. In conclusion, through the analysis of these articles, it is shown that social media plays an important role in the contemporary socio-political environment. Social media as

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a tool has revolutionized the worlds experience of elections and has proven to drive mass international social and political action. From the expanding Twitterverse to Facebook, politicians and candidates are able to enhance their campaigns goals and reach out to their voters with targeted and persuasive messages. Social media is a great medium for candidates to share information and to promote and publicize their campaign, and is correspondingly effective and beneficial to supporters.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY References

Elmer, G. (2012). Live research: Twittering an election debate. Published academic article, Communications of the ACM, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Available from Carleton Library. Retrieved from http://nms.sagepub.com.proxy.library.carleton.ca/content/15/1/18.full.pdf html Garrett, K., & Danziger, J. (2011). The internet electorate. Published academic article, Communications of the ACM, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Available from ACM Digital Library. Retrieved from http://dl.acm.org.proxy.library.carleton.ca/citation.cfm?id=1897881&bnc=1 Howard, P., & Hussain, M. (2011). The role of digital media. Published academic article, Mass Communication and Society, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Available from Carleton Library. Retrieved from http://muse.jhu.edu.proxy.library.carleton.ca/journals/journal_of_democracy/v022/22.3.h oward.html Johnson, T., & Perlmutter, D. (2010). The facebook election: new media and the 2008 election campaign. Published academic article, Mass Communication and Society, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Available from Carleton Library. Retrieved from http://content.ebscohost.com.proxy.library.carleton.ca/pdf25_26/pdf/2010/7MK/01Nov10 /55310463.pdf?T=P&P=AN&K=55310463&S=R&D=ufh&EbscoContent=dGJyMNLe8 0SeqLI4zdnyOLCmr0ueqLFSr6q4SreWxWXS&ContentCustomer=dGJyMPGutlC1qbV RuePfgeyx44Dt6fIA Vergeer, M. (2012). Politics, elections and online campaigning: Past, present.. and a peek into the future. Published academic article, Mass Communication and Society, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Available from Carleton Library. Retrieved from http://nms.sagepub.com.proxy.library.carleton.ca/content/15/1/9.full