Social Media and Politics Theoretical and Methodological

							Deliberation analysis on YouTube?


           Maja Turnšek Hančič
   University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Social
             Sciences, Slovenia
        maja.turnsek@fdv.uni-lj.si
          Presentation Outline

 Theoretical background & main research
   question
 Online deliberation analysis
 Methodological considerations:
-selection of cases
-unit(s) of analysis
-authorship and participation
-transcription and archiving
-visual, textual and audio modes
-ethical considerations
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 Theoretical background & main research
                 question

• Public sphere and deliberative democracy
  theories
• Globalisation

RQ: Are there any processes of international
  publics emerging on YouTube through public
  deliberation on global problems?



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                Online deliberation analysis
• Meta-analysis: 32 research projects which employed content or/and
   social network analysis while analyzing online discussions
-common: selection of cases, selection of unit(s) of analysis, and
   analysis of specific variables: normative ideals of public deliberation
   (e.g. reciprocity, reason giving, politeness, equality, diversity of
   opinion etc.)
• Previous research
-textual mode of production
-analyzed what was percieved as one genre: individual’s expression of
   opinion
-small variety of actors (individual citizens, political officials, civil society
   organisations’ representatives)

• Analysis of video sharing portals
-combination of different modes (e.g. voice, music, video, pictures etc.)
-enormous variety of genres
-wider variety of different producers of online content (individuals, mass
   media and political and civic organisations – as collective entitites
   and/or their representatives)
                 Selection of cases
• Previous research: usually selected threads or forums
   that were percieved as political and made a selection of
   posts
YouTube:
• Word search (YouTube’s search engine)
Selection of theme – researcher: what “should” they be
   discussing about?
Criteria for selection:
- date of publishing (most similar to random sampling –god
   for genre analysis)
- view count and rating (analysis of popularity)
- rating by relevance (criteria are not known)
Other possible criteria: type of author, type of genre,
   number of posts, only political videos and posts (e.g
   Graham 2008)
• Snowballing (could be well combined with social
   network analysis)
               Unit(s) of analysis
• Previous research: post, thread, forum
• Analysis of YouTube: video & post, video &
  posts thread, network of videos and posts
• Smaller unit (Stromer – Galley 2007)
-change of the author of text
-change of the theme of text (whether the author
  talks on the specific issue or changes the topic)
YouTube:
-change of mode of production (e.g combining
  media reports, power point pictures and
  interviews with experts, all in one video)
             Authorship and participation
•    Previous research: one post, one author – everything
     else was a citation or referencing
•    Video: depends on the genre of video (e.g. “mashup”,
     individual’s mass media posting, lecture, documentary,
     individual’s personal expression…)
Example of “mashup”:
original author – the video units that are recognized as a
     direct expression of the author of the video post will be
     of specific focus in the analysis;
“referenced author” – other sources, that the original author
     employs within the video post will be analysed in
     relation to the expression to the original author (in terms
     of their function for original author’s claims; eg. of
     providing an example for original author’s statement)
               Example: Any truth?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpFDq8J-8gc
       original author: laqhn, Great Britain
          overall theme: financial crisis
             Video unit: Whole video
               Genre anaylsis

Criteria:
• - type of original author,
• - type of referenced author,
• - mode of expression of original author,
• - mode of expression of referenced author
  (e.g. mass media genre)
                   Examples
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUSw1Osr90
  s - original mass media news report
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1p4YfH74wfY
  - individual’s posting of mass media news report
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkQ7Y4umjH
  E - Intergovernmental organization (OECD)
  interview
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT2Wg7lVYAs
  - Individual’s own speech (visual non-anonymity)
Transcription & archiving
            Textual, audio, video

• Previous research and theory: deliberation
  understood as rational verbal expression –
  does this exclude emotional appeals for
  which video and audio modes are mostly
  used?
• Functions of video and audio expressions
  in relation to textual expression should be
  analyzed (genre analysis)
           Ethical considerations
• Previous research:
-considered online discussion as public expression
-sometimes avoided identification
-Gaining approval? – not in these cases since they
   percived the conversation as political and thus
   public
• YouTube:
-themes which are not considered as personal or
   intimate
-What about in cases where the author deleted the
   video?
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