Speaker: Kendra Calhoun
Title: Algorithmic influences on everyday digital discourse: Linguistic (self)censorship and innovation on TikTok
Abstract: Over the past several years, the influence of algorithms on our social media experiences has become increasingly visible. One phenomenon that has garnered widespread public attention is algorithmic content moderation and its influence on language used in online spaces. Commonly referred to as “algospeak,” the innovative discourse that social media users employ to avoid detection by automated content moderation is now a topic of public debate: is it warranted? Is it effective? is it the demise of language? when will it end?
In this talk I forgo questions of whether or not these discursive innovations are necessary and instead analyze the sociopolitical and discursive reality of the phenomenon. Using multimodal TikTok discourse involving text, speech, and gesture as examples, I demonstrate that the discursive forms TikTok users have created are new iterations of long-standing discourse practices (e.g., language play) that can now be enacted through the digital communicative possibilities the TikTok platform affords. I also demonstrate how the topics and users most involved in this practice – e.g., sex, gender, people of color – reflect the political nature of algorithms and discuss their material impact on the lives of social media users from marginalized groups.
Bio: Kendra Calhoun is a linguistic anthropologist and sociolinguist in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her research on digital culture and communication examines how digital technologies shape discourse practices, identity construction, and mechanisms of social connection, as well as demonstrating how our online and offline worlds are inextricably interconnected. Her work centers questions of race, identity, and power on social media and she has analyzed Black digital discourse and culture on Vine, Tumblr, and TikTok. Her current research examines Black TikTok as a digital community and the ways the TikTok platform affords novel ways of constructing and contesting ideas about Blackness in the U.S.