Gerard G. Dabu
Information and Computer Science & Sociology Proposal in Social Sciences
Participation for Honors
Oral Presentation: 12:15p in C101
Online Social Justice Movements and Countermovements
Online interactions, primarily in the form of social media, have played a key role in many recent conflicts over social justice issues (such as sexism, racism, classism, homophobia, etc.), such as bringing attention to and hosting arguments about the events in Ferguson. While both social justice issues and online interactions have been studied, the expanding intersection of these remains relatively untouched. This proposed investigation will explore the nature of online conflicts over social justice issues, in order to ascertain common patterns, structures, and future lines of inquiry. Traditional survey, interview, and observation methods, along with computational analysis (including machine learning techniques) of text and other bulk data (especially social network structures) will be employed.
Mentor: Dr. Sun-Ki Chai