[Air-L] CFP Special Issue for New Media & Society: "Contextual Complexities of Violence on Digital Platforms"

[Tom Divon]

Dear community members!

We are thrilled to share with you this CFP for our Special Issue with New
Media & Society devoted to "Contextual Complexities of Violence on Digital
Platforms"

*Context*
The world now seems more fraught with violence than ever, intricately
interwoven into the fabric of our contemporary digital ecosystem. The
escalating accessibility and ubiquity of digital platforms across the globe
have facilitated a corresponding rise in the frequency of violence
perpetrated through diverse infrastructural channels. So far, studies have
observed a growing prevalence of violence executed on and through digital
platforms. For example, research has emphasized that platform affordances
like Feeds and DMs provide perpetrators with new avenues to exert control,
intimidate, surveil, and harass women (Dragiewicz et al., 2018; Jane,
2014). Others have shown how audiovisual memes can be manipulated to expand
and reproduce hate speech (Matamoros-Fernández et al., 2023), along with
studies exploring the distressing psychological repercussions experienced
by users exposed to content featuring real-world violence (Stubbs et al.,
2022). Undoubtedly, digital environments have emerged as spaces that
simultaneously sustain and expand intersecting forms of symbolic violence,
including racism (Jakubowicz, 2017) and gender inequality (Cepeda, 2018).
They have also become battlegrounds for countering and contesting forms of
material and cultural violence, such as anti-racist efforts and police
accountability (Lamont-Hill, 2018), as well as digital mobilization to
advocate for differently-abled individuals (Mann, 2018).

Within this broad context, this special issue strives to enhance the
understanding of the diverse forms, actors, and perceptions associated with
online violence, serving as a crucial stride toward cultivating a healthier
digital landscape. Specifically, as advocated by Dwyer (2017), we wish to
emphasize the importance of contextualizing violent behavior and content
within their respective cultural and historical frameworks. This call for
contextualized understandings of violence arises at a time when addressing
online harm necessitates a multifaceted approach, encompassing political,
technical, and social dimensions, to effectively navigate the intricacies
of local cultures. This significance is highlighted by Schoenebeck et al.
(2023), underscoring the pivotal role of local culture as the foremost
determinant of how individuals perceive violence on digital platforms. In
this context, nuanced examinations of digital violence are indispensable
for crafting fitting responses to the multifaceted ecologies of violence on
social media. Therefore, our objective in this issue is to compile
contributions that explore the impact, reach, and various manifestations of
online violence as experienced and perceived within specific sociocultural
contexts.

Underlying the goal of this call for papers is a desire to engage with
scholars who are exploring violence on digital platforms as a cultural
experience (Cover, 2022) that reinforces or resists existing power
structures (Marwick, 2021; McCosker, 2014). Our call welcomes scholars to
delve into the stickiness of mediated violence (Zelinzer, 2023),
encouraging contributions on how online harm can serve as vehicles for both
productive and destructive forces within contemporary cultures. We
especially encourage interdisciplinary contributions that go beyond
definitional or methodological issues around violence on digital platforms
and emphasize its social, political, and ethical implications (Jane, 2015)
on a global scale, with a particular emphasis on non-Western contexts.
Accordingly, we invite submissions that address topics including, but not
limited to, the following:

● Perceptions, experiences, and actors involved in the symbiotic
relationship of offline
and digital violence within various sociocultural contexts.
● Perceptions, experiences, and actors involved in algorithmic violence
enacted within
specific communities and contextual settings.
● Perpetuation and amplification of symbolic violence through digital
platforms.
● Networked violence centered around attacking and revealing the identity
of digital
personas (e.g., doxxing as a form of violence exacted on minoritized
individuals).
● Collective mobilization and contestation to counter material and symbolic
violence on
digital platforms.
● Escalating endorsement of violence as a method for collective
mobilization.
● Digital resistance of platform and algorithmic bias.

*Information for authors*
Potential contributors should submit a 1,200-word abstract (excluding
references), a 100-word bio, and the corresponding author's contact
information to the guest editors. Feel free to consult the special issue
editors about your article ideas and potential angles or approaches. After
the abstracts have been selected, authors will be invited to submit a full
paper. Please note that acceptance of an abstract does not guarantee
publication, given that all papers will go through the journal’s peer
review process.

*Abstract structure*
The extended abstract should present a coherent narrative on online
violence while highlighting how the authors respond to the special issue
call. It must emphasize the distinctive contributions of the study and
provide an introduction to the empirical case study being explored.
Furthermore, the abstract should outline the research methods employed and
provide a clear indication within the findings section of the current stage
of the work, whether it is still to be completed, in development, or at the
writing phase.

Extended Abstract submission: April 1, 2024
Invited submission notification: May 1, 2024
Full paper submission: November 1, 2024

See the full CFP here:
https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1MxAt0j72EYvJZ-HnTDoM6-kkWNjF6jst

For any inquiries, please feel free to contact the editorial team at
violenceondigitalplatforms at gmail.com

-- 




*Tom Divon*
Media & Culture R*esearcher*
Dept. of Communication & Journalism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Sammy Ofer School of Communications, IDC, Herzliya
Tel: +972-547-532681
[image: Twitter] <https://twitter.com/TomDivon>[image: Instagram]
<https://www.instagram.com/divon.tom/>[image: Facebook]
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*Publications*:
Playful Activism: Memetic Performances of Palestinian Resistance in TikTok
#Challenges
<https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/20563051231157607>.
Playful Publics on TikTok: The Memetic Israeli-Palestinian War of #CHALLENGE
<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366530633_Playful_Publics_on_TikTok_The_Memetic_Israeli-Palestinian_War_of_CHALLENGE>
.
#JewishTikTok: The JewToks' Fight against Antisemitism
<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/359548581_JewishTikTok>.
Serious TikTok: Can You Learn About the Holocaust in 60 seconds?
<https://reframe.sussex.ac.uk/digitalholocaustmemory/2022/03/24/can-you-learn-about-the-holocaust-in-60-seconds-on-tiktok/>
PERFORMING DEATH AND TRAUMA? PARTICIPATORY MEM(E)ORY AND THE HOLOCAUST IN
TIKTOK# POVCHALLENGES
<https://spir.aoir.org/ojs/index.php/spir/article/view/12995>

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