Due April 9. Bring a hardcopy of your essay
(double spaced, 12pt font) to class. 15% of final grade.

Hashtags are currently the primary mechanism through which online material is archived, searched, and disseminated. For this assignment, you are responsible for observing, tracking, and collecting the associated content of one hashtag related to Indigenous studies (e.g. #idlenomore; #NODAPL, #culturalappropriation, etc). After monitoring your hashtag (for at least a week), write up a 5 page, double-spaced analysis of what you’ve learned.

Each of you will likely be studying a different hash tag and using different methods, so these projects will be unique in approach and in outcome. That being said, you will all be following similar steps:

  • Select a hashtag. Before you get started, look at through the varied hashtags on Indigenous issues and choose one reflects your own interests, but is also being actively engaged by users. It is possible to do research on a stagnant hashtag, but this assignment is about conversations happening in the moment. If you’re unsure where to begin, you might try researching #IndigenousTwitter or #NativeTwitter. I also recommend following some of the Indigenous Twitter “influencers” out there, as listed in the “required reading” section of this syllabus.
  • Collect your data: once you’ve decided on a hashtag, start monitoring the conversation happening around it. This means checking in several times a day and taking notes about what you observe. You should also be saving artifacts to use as evidence in your paper: take screen shots and add content to storify, evernote, or similar software. You may also use a twitter archiving system too, such as TAGS. Depending on the hashtag and methods you chose, the amount of time spent collecting data will vary. Aim for having at least a week’s worth of material.
  • Determine your method of analysis: Once you feel that you have a strong archive of data, you’ll need to decide how you want to analyze and interpret it. If you have a background in quantitative methods, you may want to apply simple statistical analysis to make sense of your data. You may also use a visualization tool, such as mentionmap, twitonomy, or keyhole. You might also plug your data into a word cloud generator to track usage of specific words. You may also use qualitative approach, using close reading or ethnographic methodologies for interpretation. We will be reading several published pieces on social media analysis in class, so there will be time to discuss and consider different approaches. You can find more tools here.
  • Write it up: Your deliverable for this assignment is a short essay that a) introduces your hashtag; b) describes your methods for collecting and analyzing your data; c) interprets the data; and d) draws conclusions about what you’ve observed. There is no strict word or page count for this assignment, but you should aim for 1200 words. Include screenshots or other images if you think it will benefit your analysis.

Learning Outcomes: The goal of this assignment is to engage students with critical discussion around Indigenous issues on social media and to provide them with tools to critically analyze trends and discourse.