University of Central Florida STARS Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020- 2021 How Twitter Exposes Daily Whiteness Practices in Mexico and Argentina Erika Maribel Heredia University of Central Florida, [email protected] Part of the Race and Ethnicity Commons, and the Social Media Commons Find similar works at: https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd2020 University of Central Florida Libraries http://library.ucf.edu This Doctoral Dissertation (Open Access) is brought to you for free and open access by STARS. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020- by an authorized administrator of STARS. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STARS Citation Heredia, Erika Maribel, "How Twitter Exposes Daily Whiteness Practices in Mexico and Argentina" (2021). Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-. 694. https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd2020/694 HOW TWITTER EXPOSES DAILY WHITENESS PRACTICES IN MEXICO AND ARGENTINA By ERIKA MARIBEL HEREDIA M.A. Humanistic Studies, Tecnológico de Monterrey, 2014 B.A. Audiovisual Communication, Universidad Blas Pascal, 2005 A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Texts and Technology in the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida Summer Term, 2021 Major Professor: Mel Stanfill © 2021 Erika M Heredia ii ABSTRACT This dissertation questions: How is the social imaginary about the meaning of being white in Mexico produced, reproduced, and problematized in Twitter Discourse? How is the social imaginary about the meaning of being white in Argentina produced, reproduced, and problematized in Twitter Discourse? How are the social imaginaries in Twitter Discourse in Mexico and Argentina related to the cultural and symbolic power exercised by the United States, and does US power influence the structure of privileges built around Whiteness? For doing that, I collected up to 10K tweets using two keywords to identify discourses surrounding Whiteness in tweets from users in Mexico and Argentina and analyzed up to 300 tweets per keyword using Critical Discourse Analysis tools. The findings demonstrate that research on Twitter is valid to explore communities from inside and interpret problems that go beyond digital environments. Furthermore, Twitter provides a unique opportunity to review Whiteness and question its privilege structures. In addition, the tweets operate as a cultural manifestation of the latent social unrest gruesomely exposing racism, dehumanization, eliminationism, and contempt for otherness favored by the affordances of the medium. My approach focused on Argentina and Mexico tweets as selected cases able to reflect the reality of the region in order to explore the function of Whiteness in everyday conversations, considering the impact of digital technologies in society. Both countries represent well-differentiated social structures, and embody particular ways of living ethnicity, cultural capitalism, and globalization. Although to be considered ‘white’ in Argentina is not the same as in Mexico, they also retain certain identity features related to conceptions of Whiteness that allow its study. Even more interesting, I found that studying iii Whiteness in these two countries also illustrated the influence of the United States as a cultural and symbolic power in the development of white supremacist ideas. Keywords: Whiteness – Twitter – Critical Discourse Analyses – Mexico – Argentina – Social Imaginary iv Para Mara, por su generosidad… Esta aventura comenzó aquí en Orlando, una noche de verano, caminando por el campus de esta hermosa universidad y preguntándonos ¿por qué no? Y fue un espectacular salto de fe. This adventure started here in Orlando, one summer night walking around the campus of this beautiful university and wondering why not? And it was a spectacular leap of faith. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This Dissertation compresses into very few pages hours of work, love and solidarity of many people to whom I will always be grateful. I am deeply grateful to the Department of Texts & Technology as a whole who invited me to go through this experience and did what was necessary to having me here. Special thanks to Patty Hurter, Carla Gripp, and Dr. Anastasia Salter for dealing with students with such resolve and precision. An infinite thank you to my mentor and chair of committee, Dr. Mel Stanfill, who spent hours reviewing this manuscript and knew how to guide me with great patience so that I managed to organize my ideas and express them clearly; for their immense generosity, their dedication and above all for believing in me. That made all the difference. Total thanks to my committee: Dr. Barry Mauer whose out-of-the-box way of thinking vibrated with mine. To Dr. Scot French for his challenging questions and his support. To Dr. Beatriz Reyes-Foster and Dr. Ana Del Sarto whose concern for accuracy in reading of the social imaginaries of Mexico and Argentina was decisive in the construction of the narrative behind the tweets. Immense gratitude to: To my family in Argentina: to my parents Hugo and Mary who always let me think what I wanted to think, to my brothers Marce, Guille and Fede for shortening the distances and making sure that everything was fine there so that I could achieve this goal here. To my nephew Fran and my niece Lucía for reminding me that we must be consistent with what we think, say and do. To my cousin Nancy for the dulce de leche and for connecting with my extended family. To Jorge, vi wherever you are, for his advice on life and decisions. To Liz, my sister, wherever you are, for loving me. To my friends, Coty, Mariana, Laura and Penelope for having been my support network in many difficult moments; because they listened to miles of audios and responded to each one with kindness and enthusiasm, despite the distance. To Raúl, for being my life partner, for his love, for his hugs, for being my home and my family. For encouraging me to take this giant step and being here for me. For him, my absolute loyalty and all my love. To my therapist Isibel Moreno for her valuable advice, and to my other therapist Arturo Cintron Torres for introducing me to cognitive behavioral therapy. To my classmates, for being open minded and patiently listening to my interventions, especially Sahar, Ream and Corine. To my teachers because they made me feel that my work was important and necessary, and that the language is not a barrier if the idea is well founded. To Dr. Lucas Izquierdo for his contributions about 19th Century hygienist movement, and to Dr. Amy L. Giroux for her tweet scraping software. To the anonymous people who with their little tweets gave shape to this Dissertation. To all the scholars and theorists whose ideas allowed me to delve into social imaginaries to understand what is behind every word thrown into the cybersphere. To all the people that I do not name due to space and memory limitations but who made my days easier and treated me with affection, kindness and respect and doing that they made me feel welcome. vii TABLE OF CONTENT LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................... xi LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ xii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................... 1 1. The new cyber public sphere.......................................................................................... 2 2. Defining Whiteness ........................................................................................................ 4 3. Twitter cultural relevance .............................................................................................. 8 4. About this Dissertation ................................................................................................. 14 4.1. The selection of keywords ................................................................................... 16 4.2. Data collection ..................................................................................................... 20 4.2.1. Linking the United States............................................................................ 23 4.3. Data analysis ........................................................................................................ 26 5. Chapter outline ............................................................................................................. 29 CHAPTER 2: BEING PRIETO: THE COMPLICATED REALITY OF MESTIZAJE ............... 31 1. Mestizaje, a living myth ............................................................................................... 32 1.1. Racism is not here ................................................................................................ 33 1.2. Stratified society .................................................................................................. 39 2. About Indian people and their position in society ....................................................... 43 2.1. Indigenous references .......................................................................................... 46 2.1.1 Civilization and alimentation ....................................................................... 47 2.1.2. Looking like Indians ..................................................................................