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Gatewatching and News Curation: The Lecture Series

Mon, 24/04/2023 - 15:36 — Snurb
Politics
Gatewatching and Citizen Journalism
Journalism
Industrial Journalism
‘Fake News’
Blogs and Blogging
Social Media
Echo Chambers and Filter Bubbles
Facebook
Twitter
General Teaching Work

One of the major components of my guest professorship at the University of Zürich in late 2022 was to develop and deliver a one-off undergraduate course on gatewatching and the continuing transformation of journalism as a result of the impact of social media, from the early days of blogs and citizen journalism to the present. This builds on my 2018 book Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. I also took the opportunity to augment the book's contents with a handful of additional lectures on topics such as 'fake news', fact-checking, 'filter bubbles', and the power of social media platforms - topics that have emerged and grown in importance even further since the book was published.

The lectures were all recorded, and it would be a shame if the material went to waste after it's one-off presentation in Zürich. So, I'm pleased to say that after a little light editing, the 13 weekly lectures from this course are now online, and collected in a handy YouTube playlist. They're each running between 60 and 90 minutes in length, and the slides are also available separately (they're linked from the description of each video). I've listed the full syllabus of readings below.

I hope this is useful, and would love to see these lectures be used in teaching wherever they might suit – for instance in undergraduate journalism, media studies, or social media courses. Please share these materials with anyone who might be able to benefit from them.


Literature

1. Introduction: What's So Different about Journalism Today?

Axel Bruns. Introduction. Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 1. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

2. From Gatekeeping to Gatewatching: The First Wave of Citizen Media

Axel Bruns. “From Gatekeeping to Gatewatching: The First Wave of Citizen Media.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 2. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

3. #BREAKING: Social News Curation during Acute Events

Axel Bruns. “#BREAKING: Social News Curation during Acute Events.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 3. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

4. Random Acts of Gatewatching: Everyday Newssharing Practices

Axel Bruns. “Random Acts of Gatewatching: Everyday Newssharing Practices.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 4. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

5. Weaponising Newssharing: 'Fake News' and Other Malinformation

Axel Bruns, Stephen Harrington, & Edward Hurcombe. “Coronavirus Conspiracy Theories: Tracing Misinformation Trajectories from the Fringes to the Mainstream.” In Monique Lewis, Eliza Govender, & Kate Holland (Eds.), Communicating COVID-19: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. Cham: Springer, 2021. 229-249. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-79735-5_12

6. Meet the Audience: How Journalists Adapt to Social Media

Axel Bruns. “Meet the Audience: How Journalists Adapt to Social Media.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 5. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

7. Management and Metrics: The News Industry and Social Media

Axel Bruns. “Management and Metrics: The News Industry and Social Media.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 6. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

8. Hybrid News Coverage: Liveblogs

Axel Bruns. “Hybrid News Coverage: Liveblogs.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 7. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

9. 'Real' News and 'Fake' News: Fact-Checking and Media Literacy

Lucas Graves & Federica Cherubini. The Rise of Fact-Checking Sites in Europe. Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, 2016. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:d55ef650-e351-4526-b942-6c9e00129ad7

10. New(s) Publics in the Public Sphere

Axel Bruns. “New(s) Publics in the Public Sphere.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 8. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

11. Echo Chambers? Filter Bubbles? Reviewing the Evidence

Axel Bruns. “Echo Chambers? Filter Bubbles? The Misleading Metaphors That Obscure the Real Problem.” In Marta Pérez-Escolar & José M. Noguera-Vivo (Eds.), Hate Speech and Polarization in Participatory Society. London: Routledge, 2022. 33-48. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003109891-4

12. Platform Power: How Social Media Platforms Reshape the News Industry

James Meese & Edward Hurcombe. “Facebook, News Media and Platform Dependency: The Institutional Impacts of News Distribution on Social Platforms.” New Media & Society 23.8 (2021): 2367-2384. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444820926472

13. Conclusion: A Social News Media Network

Axel Bruns. “Conclusion: A Social News Media Network.” Gatewatching and News Curation: Journalism, Social Media, and the Public Sphere. Ch. 9. New York: Peter Lang, 2018.

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