This talk addresses central questions to the #MeToo movement and examines the evolution of the movement over time and space. Drawing from a thematic analysis of 960 tweets for English, 960 tweets for German, and 753 tweets for Mandarin, this presentation explores how the #MeToo movement was taken up and used in different ways in the first 12 months.
The presentation draws on the concept of platform vernacular to examine how X (formerly Twitter) users engage in the movement. The talk argues that these vernacular practices function more than simply as the dominant “grammars of communication” in #MeToo but connect individual experiences of sexual violence to broader political structures such as patriarchy, homophobia, xenophobia, and racism.
The presentation contributes to scholarship in the field of new media, feminism, and communication by showing how hashtags are taken up by the public in different ways and how shared vernacular practices emerge across languages, even when the content, focus, or rhetoric may diverge.
About Alumni events
UQ alumni and community events take place in-person and online, across the globe, throughout the year. UQ alumni are invited to join the UQ ChangeMakers platform to access early event registrations, benefits and discounts.
