I will be presenting two different projects at this year's digital version of ICA. Both videos will be avialable to conference participants throughout the entirety of the conference from 27 - 31 May. Once the conference is over, I will upload the full presentation videos under the "Conferences" tab.
Here is the official conference website:
"Critical Messages About Classic Memorials? A Case Study of Individual Online Interactions With Public Memory of Dr. King"
This talk presents the results from an online case study which is part of a larger project. For this case study, 241 Instagram images and 5 Instagram videos by 118 users are analyzed using a qualitative content analysis. The results are triangulated with qualitative interviews with 22 of the producers.
Results show that users see the memorial as part of something larger, both in terms of tourism and in terms of public memory.
Visually, the visitors reproduce the ever-same images but instead of this being a sign of mindless reproductions of dominant narratives, it can be read as a contribution to the memorials' value: By helping with its canonization, the visitors help the memorial reach its full poptential.
Textually, the individuals do not talk much about their tourism experiences. Even if the images locate the posts in a tourism narrative, the captions in fact talk about public memory. Users make it clear that they see the memorial as more than a pure marker of history: They make explicit connections to the present and future and thus show their understanding of public memory and of the importance of the memorial.
The physical memorial is seen as an important structure exactly because it is a stoic, permanent marker situated in the public realm: it is there to assign official value.
The online interactions are used to ensure that the memorial and the person it meorializes does not become seen as "history" but instead keeps getting updated as public memory.
After the conference, you can find the video presentation below: