I ended the first post in this series claiming that Facebook is a space for developing Pragmatic Meaning, while Twitter is not. As discussed in the last post, we are looking at a long-tail process when we set about making meaning in a political environment. In the context of a political movement if we compare the … Continue reading A Post on Pragmatic Meaning: Part 2
Politics
Stuff that’s happening in politics, discourse, social media and technology.
A Post on Pragmatic Meaning: Part 1
The title of this website refers to Habermas’s Theory of Pragmatic Meaning, and uses a reference to the coffee house as the place where political meaning is made regardless of class, family, or economic station. With this in mind, I’m currently writing a paper for the International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences that draws on … Continue reading A Post on Pragmatic Meaning: Part 1
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year. 2011 has been exciting and here's to 2012!
New Media, Old Tactics: Humor and Ridicule in Political Protest
A friend of mine living in Cape Town forwarded a humorous advertisement for Nando’s Chicken, a restaurant chain based in South Africa. The advertisement carried the title “The Last Dictator Standing” and provided an enjoyable laugh, especially for those with some knowledge of African dictatorships: After watching, I started to think about the role that … Continue reading New Media, Old Tactics: Humor and Ridicule in Political Protest
Happy Holidays!
Happy holidays! I'm in Upstate New York, far from regular internet access, so updates will have to wait until after the holiday. In the meantime, safe travels to everyone, and look for new posts coming after the 27th.
Using mixed methods to understand a mixed field
So after 13 weeks and 4000 pages of reading, I finally finished all my term papers on December 16. My goal was to explore the world of ICT4D and ICT4Peace in ways I hadn't thought of before. I was introduced to anthropological theories of the person (challenging for me, a dedicated positivist), and critical theory … Continue reading Using mixed methods to understand a mixed field
Charles P. Martin-Shields 