The paper aims to contribute to the still relatively unexplored area of the relationship between gender and online political participation. Using two complementary methods -a representative, post-election survey of the adult Czech population, and a content analysis of communication on the selected Czech political parties' Facebook profiles during the campaign for the 2013 Parliamentary Elections, we attempt to challenge some established assumptions regarding the allegedly equalizing effect of the Internet and social media on participatory behaviour of men and women. While survey data discovered subtle yet statistically significant differences between men and women in some online expressive activities on Facebook, mainly commenting on other users' statuses, content analysis further revealed that there are not only notable gender gaps among the Facebook users who commented on the campaign, but also differences in the tone of communication produced by the respective gender groups, with men posting more negative comments addressed to parties as well as to other Facebook users. We suggest that these results question the prevailing perception about the narrowing of the 'gender gap' in the online environment and call for a more nuanced methodological approach to different forms of online political expression.
This paper analyses the contemporary public debate about vaccination, and medical knowledge more broadly, in the context of social media. The study is focused on the massive online debate prompted by the Facebook status of the digital celebrity Mark Zuckerberg, who posted a picture of his two‐month‐old daughter, accompanied by a comment: ’Doctor's visit – time for vaccines!’ Carrying out a qualitative analysis on a sample of 650 comments and replies, selected through systematic random sampling from an initial pool of over 10,000 user contributions, and utilising open and axial coding, we empirically inform the theoretical discussion around the concept of the reflexive patient and introduce the notion of multi‐layered reflexivity. We argue that the reflexive debate surrounding this primarily medical problem is influenced by both biomedical and social scientific knowledge. Lay actors therefore discuss not only vaccination, but also its political and economic aspects as well as the post‐truth information context of the debate. We stress that the reflexivity of social actors related to the post‐truth era re‐enters and influences the debate more than ever. Furthermore, we suggest that the interconnection of different layers of reflexivity can either reinforce certainty or deepen the ambiguity and uncertainty of reflexive agents.
The aim of this article is to explain the reasons behind the persisting gender gap in online political communication by examining the experience of women who are among the most visible and active participants in the online discussions on political issues. Data gathered through in-depth interviews reveal that women employ specific strategies to succeed in this environment and to deal with sexist ad hominem assaults – they either emphasize qualities traditionally considered feminine and act as ‘witty divas’ or ‘nice mothers’ or accommodate to the masculine character of the environment by adopting a ‘tough approach’. Some of them even experiment with masculine profiles. These strategies seem to reproduce the traditional patriarchal binary frame and show that even influential women strategically subordinate themselves to the rules of the male-dominated participatory sphere.
disinformation news websites in the Czech Republic. In conclusions, the paper evaluates the challenges these new patterns of (dis)information consumption pose for the post-transition public sphere in the Czech Republic, especially in context of the processes of democratic deconsolidation and the rise of illiberalism.
This article presents research findings exploring discursive qualities of political talk on migration and Islam in a female-dominated parenting forum. Approaching the concept of ‘third spaces’ from a feminist perspective, it aims at revealing whether the primarily non-political online forum serves as a sheltered environment for women who are marginalized in online political discussions in other spaces. The results of our content analysis show that despite a very high level of incivility in the parenting forum, women create a space in which they protect themselves from harmful personal attacks and humiliation and that the participating male minority seems to respect this approach.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.