140 Characters; a Visual Approach to Hashtags

Kristin Shaw
3/28/2015

Formal Proposal | Wayne State University | Com 4140

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Formal Proposal

Introduction
Social media is a trend that cannot be ignored. Even when using other forms of media,
hashtags (#) are everywhere. After researching the topic, I felt that zeroing in on one aspect of
social media would be most productive. Since its introduction, social media has raised a lot of
eyebrows and introduced new concerns on how individuals develop and communicate. Much of
the criticism it receives is replacing interpersonal communication, and detaching humans from
real interactions with others. By using a collection of trending topics/hashtags I will create a
collection of portraits personifying what Twitter conversations would look like if they were more
than words. The definitions that these portraits will be formed from will be results of interviews,
scholarly research and real, public tweets. In this report, Twitter will be the exclusive social
media platform used to explore this topic.
The culture being created among social networks is a hot topic of scholarly research and
is actively developing. The topics that will be covered represent a multitude of demographics and
broad range of ideas. One of the first large-scale studies of the Twitter identified that it is
primarily used for conversation, news reporting, sharing information and links, and simple daily
chatter. (Why we twitter, Aslay Java et al).

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Thesis Statement
Twitter has become a landing page for daily activities, world news and social activism.
This trend has led to a new, online dialect including the use of hashtags as tools for
communication. This portrait series will exhibit hashtag culture and the communication
process of tweeting by visually demonstration.

Key terms
Communication: the activity of conveying meaning through a shared system of semiotic
rules and signs.
Feminism: the belief that all men and women should have equal rights and opportunities.
Also defined as: organized activity in support of womens rights and interests.
Hashtags: a word or an unspaced phrase prefixed with the number sign (#) to form a
label.
Hashtag activism: a term coined by media outlets which refers to the use of Twitter's
hashtags for internet activism
Meme: a humorous image, video, piece of text, etc. that is copied (often with slight
variations) and spread rapidly by Internet users.
Millennial: a person reaching young adulthood around the year 2000; a Generation Yer.
Racism: Poor treatment of or violence against people because of their race.
Selfie: an image of oneself taken by oneself using a digital camera especially for posting
on social networks
Social media: computer-mediated tools that allow people to create, share or exchange
information, ideas, and pictures/videos in virtual communities and networks.
Trending topics: the current most popular and talked-about topics on twitter. The
ranking are in real time and are changed respectively.
Twitter: a micro-blogging service with a 140-character limit for sending short messages
(tweets) that mimics SMS, enabling users to post from mobile phones in addition to the
twitter.com interface and other applications.

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Literature Review
In Black twitter? Racial hashtags, networks and contagion Sanjay Sharma explores the role of
race on social media, specifically in the realm of Twitter. Black Twitter is a phenomenon that
exists in regard to Black (especially African-American) activity on Twitter and the creation of
relative hashtags. Blacktags exist, often express a sort of racial relation and virally trend. Some
examples are given include #ifiwasntblack or #onlyintheghetto. Blacktags are often distinctive
because they virally propagate racially-charged messages that use humor and cynicism
associated with African-American culture to critique relative topics in the media. For example,
#BlackLivesMatter was created right after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the Trayvon
Martin Trial (Guynn, 2015) and #HandsUpDontShoot originated after the shooting of Michael
Brown in Ferguson, MO in 2014. (Alter, 2014) These two tags are phenomenal examples of
conversations and even movements that exist because of hashtags. What I will highlight in
portraits related to these sorts of tags, is the culture behind the movement and the power of them.
Tags that I plan to include in the project from this area of research may include:
#HandsUpDontShoot #BlackOutDay

Feminism is another cause that actively uses social media to reach target audiences,
communicate key messages, and tell stories. Hashtag Feminism, #SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen,
and the other #FemFuture explores feminist motives on social media, targets one specific trend
and expands on both sides of the conversation. Feminism was all the internet was talking about
on August 12, 2013 (Loza, 2014.) #SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen was a global trend and was
tweeted over 75,000 times. This specific hashtag intended to call-out digital feminists, and

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bring to light that the American brand of feminism is directed to white women. This specific
instance brought race into the gender conversation, contributing to the virility of the topic. After
the chatter died down, individuals were able to take a step back and reconsider feminist
practices. These phenomena spoke volumes to the failed efforts of feminist hashtag campaigns,
and acknowledged women who felt that feminism wasnt for women of color. After days of the
topic trending, women of many cultures were using Twitter as a platform to voice their stories
and worked to pronounce third-wave-feminism a multi-cultural movement.
The backlash to this specific conversation came from feminist leaders pronouncing that
because of social media hashtag feminists have found common ground and are beginning to
build ongoing conversations across profound cultural, racial, class, sex, gender and power
differences. Twitter has since become a platform for various types of feminism, leading to the
continuation of viral feminist hashtag campaigns. Feminist campaign examples include beauty
campaigns, #SpeakBeautiful (Dove, 2004) campaigns for sexual, mental and physical abuse;
#YesAllWomen (Thrift, 2014) and gender equality; #AllMenCan (Plank, 2014.)
Tags that I plan to include in the project from this area of research may include: #WhyIStayed
#HobbyLobby #RapeCultureIsWhen #SurvivorPrivilege #AllMenCan #YesAllWomen
#RealMenDontBuyGirls

Another criticism of social media, is the narcissistic environment it creates for people to
socialize in. (Dalton, 2013) The idea of a profile allows individuals to post content that is
exclusive to them; whether it be a photo or a chance to talk about a new job. The basis of social
media profiles is to allow individuals to share stories publically. Twitter provides a platform for
public one-sided debates, and allows individuals to understand whats going on in others lives

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based on handles and hashtags. Individuals depend on Twitter to feel socially accepted, and use
it to form relationships, as well as maintain them. It also doubles as a diary-like platform.
In her poem, Dalton expresses that when she is
blue and feels like posting a #sadtweet about how [she] is #foreveralone, Twitter is
always there, day or night to inform everyone who is awake just like [her] that (1) New
Tweet will quickly turn into (17) New Tweets as [she] goes on her Twitter Rampage
about how much the world and everyone in it is personally out to get [her] and they could
never understand how [she] feels. At least not like [Twitter] does.
Narcissistic content doesnt stop at pity-parties. 2013s Oxford Dictionarys Word of the Year,
#Selfie is a culture of its own (Wilson, 2014.) With the availability to personal cameras, socialmedia users have become self-obsessed and dot the internet with hundreds of thousands of selfportraits taken with a front-facing camera-phone. Based on these trends, its become habitual for
individuals to seek validation from their social networks.

The narcissistic approach to social media use is exploited by users whining about their
problems. The Know Your Meme website describes First World Problems as comprised of
frustrations and complaints thatre are only experienced by privileged individuals in wealthy
countries that is usually used as a tongue-in-cheek comedic device to make light of trivial
inconveniences. In Meme Syndrome: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the First World Problems
and Third World Success Internet Memes (Chandler, 2013,) the author explores the behavior of
social media users in the process of sharing their problems. Chandler discusses the symbolism
in memes that represent Western culture, by things as simple as having a white woman in the
center of the icon. He also states that memes fail to acknowledge the viewer (p.54), they
exclusively display the views of the individual that posted. This is another topic I would like to
represent, is the one-sidedness of social media posts. While they are often posted to incite
followers, they often represent single-views of the user.

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Tags that I plan to include in the project from this area of research may include: #Selfie #MyLife
#WhiteGirlProblems #FirstWorldProblems #SadTweet #WomanCrushWednesday #Fitspo
#Blessed #Winning

In conclusion, the use of hashtags for activism, social validation and self-expression are
undeniable. I think that the oversaturation of trending topics has an impact on the way people use
social media. The topic of social media is rapidly changing and difficult to keep up with, but
with that, research is constantly being constructed. Through the lens of these articles in
combination with personal views of millennials, I will apply theory with first-hand research to
display a visual element of social media that does not yet exist.

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Other Contributions to Project Content

Since this project will take the form of a gallery, I will use Twitter to inspire the portraits. I plan
on using the attached survey to ask participants how they visualize the hashtag. Participants are
voluntary members of the Detroit community, and will complete surveys on 5 hashtags each.
Photos will be shot and post-produced with my equipment and edited with Adobe software,
linking the hashtag to the portrait. I have asked participants to help curate a list of potential tags
to include.

Additional Tags
#Yolo #Relationshipgoals #Twinning #Beauty #BreakTheInternet #BringBackOurGirls
#JeSuisCharlie #Furbaby #Feminism #BDSM #SorryNotSorry #hashtag #theDress
#nofilter #meninist #icebucketchallenge #cantstopwontstop #thot
Survey
#
Sentiment: positive/ negative/ neutral
Pick three objects that you associate with this #
1.
2.
3.
What gender does this # represent?
What race does this # represent?
What sexuality does this # represent?
Do you believe this # is relevant?
Do you use #?
Age:
Gender:
Race
Education:

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References
Alter, C. (2014, December 1). St. Louis Cops Condemn Rams' 'Hands Up, Don't Shoot' Gesture.
retrieved from http://time.com/3611556/st-louis-cops-rams-hands-up-dont-shoot-nflferguson/
Curry Chandler, R. (2013). Meme Syndrome: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the First World
Problems and Third World Success Internet Memes.
Dalton, L. (2013). Love Poem for a Narcissistic Twitter Feed. Fishladder, 11(1).
Dove Campaign for Real Beauty. (2004). Retrieved from http://www.dove.us/SocialMission/campaign-for-real-beauty.aspx
Guynn, U. (2015, March 4). Meet the woman who coined #BlackLivesMatter. Retrieved March
9, 2015, from http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2015/03/04/alicia-garza-black-livesmatter/24341593/
Java et al, A. (2009). Why We Twitter: An analysis of a Microblogging Community. 118-138.
Loza, S. (2014). Hashtag feminism,# SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen, and the other# FemFuture.
Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, (5).
Plank, E. (2014, December 10). The 12 Most Powerful Feminist Hashtags of 2014. Retrieved
from http://mic.com/articles/104970/the-12-most-important-feminist-hashtags-of-2014
Sharma, S. (2012). Black twitter? Racial hashtags, networks and contagion. New Formations,
78, 46-58. Retrieved from http://www.lwbooks.co.uk/journals.html
Thrift, S. C. (2014). #YesAllWomen as Feminist Meme Event. Feminist Media Studies, 14(6),
1090-1092. doi:10.1080/14680777.2014.975421
Wilson, B. (2014). SELFIE. Communication: Journalism Education Today, 47(3), 11-17.