This interdisciplinary, international collection examines how sophisticated digital practices and technologies exploit and capitalize on emotions, with particular focus on how social media are used to exacerbate social conflicts surrounding racism, misogyny, and nationalism.

Radically expanding the study of media and political communications, this book bridges humanities and social sciences to explore affective information economies, and how emotions are being weaponized within mediatized political landscapes. The chapters cover a wide range of topics: how clickbait, "fake news," and right-wing actors deploy and weaponize emotion; new theoretical directions for understanding affect, algorithms, and public spheres; and how the wedding of big data and behavioral science enables new frontiers of propaganda, as seen in the Cambridge Analytica and Facebook scandal. The collection includes original interviews with luminary media scholars and journalists.

The book features contributions from established and emerging scholars of communications, media studies, affect theory, journalism, policy studies, gender studies, and critical race studies to address questions of concern to scholars, journalists, and students in these fields and beyond.

About the Author

Megan Boler is Professor in the Social Justice Education Department at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. Her research focuses on philosophy and politics of emotion; critical studies of affect, social media, and propaganda; and digital media practices within social movements. Her books include Feeling Power: Emotions and Education (1999), Democratic Dialogue in Education (2004), Digital Media and Democracy (2008), and DIY Citizenship (Ratto and Boler, 2014).

Elizabeth Davis is a PhD candidate in the Social Justice Education Department at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. Her research focuses on histories and structures of feeling drawing on materialist, feminist, critical race, disability, media, and cultural studies approaches. Her articles can be found in Theory & Event, Emotion, Space and Society, and The Senses and Society.

Reviews

"This is an invaluable guidebook to the affective landscape of our political moment, packed with contributions from original and groundbreaking thinkers. It counters the pace and tone of online propaganda with a crucial critical intervention, contributing to our understanding of the fate of understanding itself-and the consequences for political life."

Mark Andrejevic, Professor of Communications & Media Studies, Monash University

"This collection presents the state of the art for investigating affective politics. Importantly, it outlines the risks posed to our democratic institutions if we don't ensure the technical and legal fixes required to delimit social media firms capitalizing on emotional appeals and cognitive biases."

Philip N. Howard, Director, Oxford Internet Institute and Professor, Oxford University, author of Lie Machines (2020)

"This is an invaluable guidebook to the affective landscape of our political moment, packed with contributions from original and groundbreaking thinkers. It counters the pace and tone of online propaganda with a crucial critical intervention, contributing to our understanding of the fate of understanding itself-and the consequences for political life."

Mark Andrejevic, Professor of Communications & Media Studies, Monash University

"This collection presents the state of the art for investigating affective politics. Importantly, it outlines the risks posed to our democratic institutions if we don't ensure the technical and legal fixes required to delimit social media firms capitalizing on emotional appeals and cognitive biases."

Philip N. Howard, Director, Oxford Internet Institute and Professor, Oxford University, author of Lie Machines (2020)

"Affective Politics of Digital Media is a body of work that demonstrates just how central affective dynamics are to the political realities generated in an increasingly mediatized world...any chapter of this book stands as a useful entry point for scholars interested in the affective politics of digital media, with each offering a unique perspective and potential avenue for further exploration. It is therefore an important collection for anybody working in the fields of technology, media, journalism, political communications, and policy, and for those seeking to become attuned to the affective dynamics of digital media more broadly."

Rachel Billington, New Media and Society 24(6)

Book Information
ISBN 9780367510657
Author Megan Boler
Format Paperback
Page Count 366
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 453g