#Ferguson as a Case Study
By Anirudha Soni (17110016) & Nimisha John (19310035)
Twitter, since its launch in 2006, is one of the most popular social networking sites. Hashtags on Twitter have played a vital role in disseminating information and invoking protests in various issues. The present debate article uses the hashtag # Ferguson to argue for its creativity over the printed novels. Ferguson, a state in Missouri came to prominence with a fatal police shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed African American teenager in 2014. Protestors flocked to Ferguson demanding the arrest of the officer responsible for the fatal shooting. The confrontation between the police and protestors gained international attention. Hence the hashtag #Ferguson received popularity to an extent that it had appeared more than eight million times on the twitter platform by the end of that month ( Bonilla 2015).
Fictional narratives play a central role in exploring the fraught race relations in the U. S context. The rich legacy of Afro- American novels in invoking a black consciousness against racism is noteworthy. The murder of George Floyd, an Afro-American by the American Police in 2020 ignited anti-racism movement across the world. It reinvigorated black lives matter movement in online and off the ground protests. Although the hashtags invite considerable attention to race relations in America, the creative potential of fictional narratives far exceeds any other hashtags. Racial injustice in the U.S has been a central aspect of many Afro- American fictions. It explores the subtle nuances of Black experience in America with an emphasis on the everyday reality through the life of characters. Literature played a central role in the movement which stood for social justice for the black American to gain equal rights. The Afro-American literary landscape begins with slave narratives where it entails representation of brutal violence and sexual exploitation to shock the sensibility of the readers (Ostrowski 2006). As first personal narratives, it played a seminal role in exposing the reality of racism pervasive in the U.S. The popularity of slave narratives as a potential site for questions of race and social justice opened its way into academia in many universities which is itself a testimony to its impact.
Hashtags are more creative than fiction . The Hashtag revolution or popularly known as Hashtag Activism has a much wider audience. Currently, the total number of active users on twitter are approximately 330 million, and we should also take into account that it’s not just Twitter, but the whole Social Media. For instance, the total active users on Facebook are 2.8 Billion which is about 40% of the world population. If we move our eyes to fiction novels, the most sold novel on the planet stands at about 500 million, which is again just a random fiction, not any book based on social activism. The fast access to information of hashtags is also noteworthy. A typical novel takes about nine months to two years of time for its publication from a book contract. Additionally, we cannot neglect the time taken for the author to write the book and the time taken for it to become viral. Even for the promotions of the novel, nowadays the tweets are preferred. But what about a tweet, the only time it takes is the time for its virality. Else no processing time, no composition time. And according to a study by Chinese Journal PLOS ONE, the first 50 retweets are the deciding factor for the virality of tweets.
According to Microsoft Research, Tweets with news, instructions, updates get the most retweets.
For instance, #Ferguson only revolves around one form of violence which is the murder of a black man at the hands of American police. Although it opens up visibility to the harassment, it fails to account for other models of quotidian violence pervasive in Afro-American lives. The discussions and debates surround and limits to one form of violence at the expense of other oppressive mechanisms. On the other hand, novels are one of the ways in which foregrounds the other forms of violence that shapes the reality of black lives. The printed novels unravel the subtle nuances of black lives with an impact on social memory. Black novels were instrumental in foregrounding the fraught relation between black men and black women which is exemplified through the writings of Toni Morrison and Alice Walker. This stands in stark opposition to the ‘reality’ of hashtags where selected hashtags receive popularity for ‘selected issues’ where all other factors have been sidelined.
I believe no matter how good the content is, in printed novels the author’s good connection with the publishing firm is a necessary condition. Take for example, J.K Rowling, the world’s richest author, had her manuscript rejected by twelve publishers. And the manuscript later became the world’s most selling book series with more than 500 million copies sold till now. Hence, there are accessibility issues with the publishing firms while writing and publishing a book. Again, Printed fictions are always on the side of the writer, but tweeting lays open the possibility that anyone with a social media account can become a writer with their points of view and can share their experiences. Hence, in printed novels, creativity is often restricted to a single writer but the tweets can be retweeted with the expressions of the people reading them.
I consider the proposition that Twitter and hashtags as an egalitarian, politically neutral space of creativity is problematic. Despite the reach of tweets beyond one’s network, its scope is always limited. In a study conducted on ninety-two users of # Ferguson hashtag, it has been observed that the majority of tweets were from the activists( Barnard 2017). This points to the use and accessibility of hashtags as an exclusive domain of activists and journalists. Its creative accessibility is further restricted considering the digital divide apparent between white and black community in America.
There is no need for qualification to tweet. But the case is not the same with publishing a novel. If we give a look to famous authors, they are all qualified at least as graduates and they already have a considerable past in writing novels, but it is not in case of tweeting. People may or may not be qualified, but their tweet can go viral.
But the ‘viral’ tweets have certain implications. Tweets are temporal and fleeting; one tweet can replace another one in a very short period of time. Many social media hashtags are in lieu with the trend. It gives way to another hashtag with the advent of a new issue. On the other hand, printed novels and their creativity exceed over time and reach to audiences who belong to multiple generations. For instance, Afro- American literature is part of the curriculum in most of the prominent universities. It has a global outreach where it ensues debates and discussions over race and social justice. The accessibility to hashtags can further be limited as it depends on the network of a user.
Tweets are editable, but printed novels are not. There can be corrections made in the tweet, with time, say with the reveal of hidden information or with the change of time but the editing in case of novel is not possible.
Despite the limitation in terms of editing, Printed novels occupy more popularity and people tend to easily identify and connect with the experiences of the central characters. It forges solidarity and collective resistance against oppressive forces.
Hashtags are powerful enough to create solidarity across time and space. Take for example #BlackLivesMatter, #Ferguson, #MeToo. All of these hashtags had created a sense of solidarity among people across the world for the victims. It can mobilize a political action. Hashtags extend its canvas into T-Shirts, Posters, etc. which we seldom see with the title of a novel. Hashtags convey the content in simplistic form. The average reading time for a novel varies from an hour to six hours, which pretty much depends on the number of words and reading speed. It also requires a lot of patience to read a novel. There are countries where people might take more time to read novels based on language barriers. But for a tweet, it takes less than a second for Google to translate it in desired language and less than a minute to read it. We can see that Tweets are certainly time saving and novels are time consuming at the same time.
There can be alliances of parallel hashtags. For instance #Ferguson gave an impetus to #blacklivesmatter #alllivesmatter #blacktansmatter. This can recall a similar event from the past, can glue together similar movements to strengthen all of them into one single movement.
The creative impetus of Afro-American novels in the civil rights movement in America in the end of the 1950’s and beginning of the 60s points to the impact of novels in invoking collective resistance. The advent of graphic novels is another example for the successful deployment of content through an effective form. Hence, the printed novels play their part in terms of impact and reach.
References
Barnard, S.R. (2017). “Tweeting #Ferguson: Mediatized fields and the New Activist Journalist. New Media & Society. Web. http://journals.sagepub.com/eprint/GdTdSbPnfHzWMcRHmjRY/full
Bonilla, Y.& Rosa, J. (2015). #Ferguson: Digital protest, hashtag ethnography, and the racial politics of social media in the United States. American Ethnologist 42(1), 4-17
Ostrowski, C. (2017). Slavery, Labor Reform, and Intertextuality in Antebellum Print Culture: The Slave Narrative and the City-Mysteries Novel. African American Review 40(3), 493-506.
Virality of Tweet, study by PLOS ONE: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0214453
http://www.danah.org/papers/TweetTweetRetweet.pdf
