Media and Communication Studies: Digital Technologies, Activism, and Social Movements

From Fridays4Future, #metoo, and Black Lives Matter; to reactionary far-right mobilisations opposing social justice policies, multiculturalism, and feminism; new waves of social movements have swept across the world. These movements are all intricately linked to digital technologies, from hashtag activism to mainstream media. This course explores the complex relationship between media, digital technologies, and social movement activism, and the changes and continuities of this relationship over time. It brings together theories from Media and Communication Studies, Communication for Development, Sociology, and Political Science, to critically examine the role of both legacy media and new digital technologies in contemporary forms of activism, as well as to trace historically how activism and media have developed in tandem to create significant political, social, and cultural changes.