LISA MERTEN’S CONTRIBUTION TO MEDIA REPERTOIRE RESEARCH WAS PUBLISHED IN ‘FORUM: QUALITATIVE SOCIAL RESEARCH’ AND EXAMINES THE ROLE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN NEWS-RELATED MEDIA REPERTOIRES USING CONTEXTUALISED REPERTOIRE MAPS.
From the abstract: In this article, I introduce contextualized repertoire maps as a qualitative approach to the study of news-related media use. With their origins in the sociological analysis of personal networks, egocentric network maps are adapted here to visualize patterns of media use and then contextualized with qualitative interviews and data collected during participant observation.
This integrative approach is illustrated by a study of the routines and practices of news consumption within and around social media platforms. I demonstrate how the mapping exercise can complement other qualitative methods to explore the structure, meaning and processes of cross-media user practices and discuss the scope and limits for visualizing and analyzing the interrelatedness between social media platforms and traditional mass media.
The paper is available online at: http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/3235/4604
Andreas Hepp Argues for communicative robots as an emerging field of media and communication research IN THE CURRENT ISSUE OF THE media, culture & society.
Abstract: Communicative robots are defined as autonomously operating systems designed for the purpose of quasi-communication with human beings to enable further algorithmic-based functionalities – often but not always on the basis of artificial intelligence. Examples of these communicative robots can be seen in the now familiar artificial companions such as Apple’s Siri or Amazon’s Alexa, the social bots present on social media platforms or work bots that automatically generate journalistic content. In all, the article proceeds in three steps. Initially, it takes a closer look at the three examples of artificial companions, social bots and work bots in order to accurately describe the phenomenon and their recent insinuation into everyday life. This will then allow me to grasp the challenges posed by the increasing need to deal with communicative robots in media and communication research. It is from this juncture from where I would like to draw back on the discussion about the automation of communication and clearly outline how communicative robots are more likely than physical artefacts to be experienced at the interface of automated communication and communicative automation.
The paper is available online at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0163443720916412
A NEW WORKING PAPER BY USHA RAMAN (VISITING RESEARCH FELLOW AT ZEMKI, UNIVERSITY OF BREMEN) HAS BEEN PUBLISHED IN THE “COMMUNICATIVE FIGURATIONS” WORKING PAPER SERIES.
The article is entitled “Keeping the person in the data: Communicating care in the networked clinic” and can be downloaded here. Usha Raman is an Associate Professor at the Department of Communication, University of Hyderabad in India and was a ZeMKI Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Bremen in 2019.
Further Communicative Figurations Working Papers can be accessed here.
A NEW WORKING PAPER BY SIMONE NATALE (VISITING RESEARCH FELLOW AT ZEMKI, UNIVERSITY OF BREMEN) HAS BEEN PUBLISHED IN THE “COMMUNICATIVE FIGURATIONS” WORKING PAPER SERIES.
The article is entitled “To believe in Siri: A critical analysis of AI voice assistants” and can be downloaded here. Simone Natale is currently a Senior Lecturer in Communication and Media Studies at Loughborough University, UK, and Assistant Editor of the journal Media, Culture & Society and was a ZeMKI Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Bremen in 2019.
Further Communicative Figurations Working Papers can be accessed here.
CHRISTIAN NUERNBERGK (UNI TRIER) AND JAN-HINRIK SCHMIDT (HBI) PRESENT THE RESULTS OF A SURVEY AND NETWORK ANALYSIS ON THE USE OF TWITTER BY POLITICAL JOURNALISTS AT THE FEDERAL PRESS CONFERENCE IN THE CURRENT ISSUE OF THE JOURNALISTIK.
In their paper entitled “Twitter in Political Journalism”, the two authors deal with the perception and use of Twitter within the communicative figuration of political journalism, using the example of capital city journalists of the Federal Press Conference: Because journalists and politicians increasingly use social media, this figuration is changing. The essay, published in the current issue 20 of Journalistik, aims to assess the significance of Twitter in particular in the communicative practice of members of the Federal Press Conference and to determine their assessments of the suitability of microblogging services in political journalism. To this end, it combines findings from a standardised survey with network analytical indicators on the interaction relationships on Twitter. The results show that political journalists use the service most often compared to other social media. Journalists who perceive Twitter as important in the communication work of politicians use Twitter significantly more often both as a receiving and as an active communication tool. Interactions between politicians and the journalists surveyed reinforce these differences even more: For example, respondents who are mentioned by politicians in tweets consider Twitter to be more important overall in their own work and rate the service higher than their colleagues when comparing the different communication channels used by politicians.
The paper is available online at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11616-019-00557-4
