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Blacklivesmatter: How a Hashtag Maintains a Movement: a Content Analysis of the Black Lives Matter Hashtag on Twitter Ashleigh Grimes

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Blacklivesmatter: How a Hashtag Maintains a Movement: a Content Analysis of the Black Lives Matter Hashtag on Twitter Ashleigh Grimes Eastern Michigan University DigitalCommons@EMU Master's Theses, and Doctoral Dissertations, and Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations Graduate Capstone Projects 2019 #BlackLivesMatter: How a hashtag maintains a movement: A content analysis of the Black Lives Matter hashtag on Twitter Ashleigh Grimes Follow this and additional works at: https://commons.emich.edu/theses Part of the Communication Commons Recommended Citation Grimes, Ashleigh, "#BlackLivesMatter: How a hashtag maintains a movement: A content analysis of the Black Lives Matter hashtag on Twitter" (2019). Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations. 981. https://commons.emich.edu/theses/981 This Open Access Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Master's Theses, and Doctoral Dissertations, and Graduate Capstone Projects at DigitalCommons@EMU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@EMU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. #BlackLivesMatter: How a Hashtag Maintains a Movement: A Content Analysis of the Black Lives Matter Hashtag on Twitter by Ashleigh Grimes Thesis Submitted to the Department of Communication, Media, and Theatre Arts Eastern Michigan University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in Communication Thesis Committee: Doris Fields, Ph.D., Chair Raymond Quiel, M.A. July 15, 2019 Ypsilanti, MI Running head: #BLACKLIVESMATTER ii Acknowledgements I would like to give tremendous thanks to Dr. Fields and Mr. Quiel for their continuous support and patience throughout the creation of my thesis. I am forever grateful for the knowledge that you both have imparted upon me and for helping me to bring my vision to life. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Keon Pettiway, who gave me perspectives that helped me develop the topic into my final product. Moreover, I would like to thank Dr. Fields and Mr. Quiel for their constant encouragement throughout my graduate career at Eastern Michigan University. I was fortunate enough to have taken classes with both professors, and those classes allowed me to expand my knowledge and pique my interest in new topics. A special thank you to Dr. Fields for telling me I couldn’t fight the thesis process. The tediousness of the submit, revise, submit again, and revise some more can be disheartening. However, I found my way through it, in large part because of her. Dr. Fields pushed me to be a better researcher and a stronger academic writer. Additionally, thank you for being a shoulder to cry on, a friend to vent to, and a mentor to seek advice from. You have helped me to grow both personally and professionally in ways that cannot be expressed in words. Finally, I would like to thank my friends and family who have been with me on this journey through graduate school. Thank you for listening to me vent about the difficulties of my program, for sending me love and positive vibes, and for physically being there for me when you could. Honestly, the words “thank you” do not do justice to the amount of gratitude I owe you all. Each of you are truly appreciated and I love you all so much. #BLACKLIVESMATTER iii Abstract American society is consumed by social media; thus, digital activism is becoming a prevalent way of advocating for and establishing social progress. The purpose of this study was to identify the frequency of engagement with the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter by Twitter users. The data collection consisted of tweets shared between the time frame of July 17, 2014, to August 17, 2014. The methodology used was content analysis, which included the examination of the volume of Twitter tweets collected from this time frame. This research adds to the impending design of a social movement structure that includes online social movements. The present thesis aims to contribute to the larger conversation of digital activism by exploring the implications, potentialities, and contributions of the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag by analyzing how Twitter users engage with a digital social movement on Twitter. Keywords: #BlackLivesMatter, Twitter, tweets, twitter users, social movement, content analysis #BLACKLIVESMATTER iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... ii Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iii List of Tables...………………………………….………………………………. ………………. v Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Literature Review .......................................................................................................... 4 Black Lives Matter .............................................................................................................. 4 Twitter: The Platform ....................................................................................................... 10 Social Movements ............................................................................................................. 16 Content Analysis ............................................................................................................... 19 Chapter 2: Purpose of Study ......................................................................................................... 22 Chapter 3: Research Method… ..................................................................................................... 23 Chapter 4: Results ......................................................................................................................... 28 Chapter 5: Limitations and Future Research… ............................................................................ 32 Chapter 6: Discussion… ............................................................................................................... 35 References ..................................................................................................................................... 37 Appendix A: Twitter Glossary ...................................................................................................... 43 Appendix B: Twitter Profile ......................................................................................................... 46 #BLACKLIVESMATTER v List of Tables Table 1 Data Collection Process………………………………………………………………….26 Table 2 Data Collected by Date…………………………………………………………………..27 #BLACKLIVESMATTER 1 Introduction #BlackLivesMatter doesn’t mean your life isn’t important--- it means that Black lives, which are seen as without value within White supremacy, are important to your liberation. When Black people get free, everybody gets free. – Alicia Garza In the words of Gil Scott-Heron (1970), “the revolution will not be televised” … but it might be tweeted. Twitter has become integral to social movements in American society, and the Black Lives Matter movement uses the Twitter platform to further its cause. The Black Lives Matter movement highlights and fights injustices within the Black community, most notably, injustices as they pertain to police brutality against African Americans. Police brutality, specifically against African Americans, is not a new issue in America. In fact, injustice against African Americans is woven into the fabric of this country’s history. Nevertheless, the topic of police brutality has been trending in the news, due to the recent shootings of Black men and women, ranging in ages (specifically 18-64), by police officers and civilians across the United States. The use of digital activism on Twitter has highlighted these incidents significantly. Digital activism is becoming an increasingly effective way to create and establish social change. It is now commonplace for social issues to be discussed via social media platforms. Twitter, in particular, has lent itself to the discussion of social issues via the Internet. With the insertion of a hashtag to a phrase, people can spark an entire social movement. Considering this shift to a technologically driven society, and the use of social media as a catalyst for activism, studies researching the influence of social media on social movements have garnered interest among scholars. The present study seeks to understand how the #BlackLivesMatter digital social movement is engaged with by Twitter users on Twitter. This research will add to the impending design of a social movement structure that includes online #BLACKLIVESMATTER 2 social movements and will ultimately contribute to the larger conversation of digital activism. Twitter has become an invaluable resource for digital activism. Digital activism is defined as a “form of activism that uses the Internet and digital media as key platforms for mass mobilization and political action” (Fuentes, 2014). Recently, digital activism has become commonplace as a vehicle to advocate for change. Karatzogianni (2016) asserts that “smartphones and the Internet have changed the way political events, protests, and movements are organized, helping to mobilize thousands of new supporters to a diverse range of causes” (para #1). Twitter, specifically, has been utilized as a social media platform for activism as well as a vehicle to maintain social movements. Twitter is a social media platform on which a social movement can promote its message. Social media allows
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