Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
Lancaster University

Home
About FASS
- Home page
- Read the Dean's Welcome
- Contact Us
Departments
Departments
- Find departments, websites and department heads.
- Go to Department list
People
Faculty Office
- Contact Deans, admin, research support, finance and IT staff via the Faculty Office
Find all Academic and Support Staff
- Academic and support staff in departments
- General Contact information
Study Here
Undergraduate Study
- Introduction to undergraduate study
- Studying for a degree
Postgraduate Study
- Introduction to Postgraduate Study
- Go to the Graduate School Website for information about funding, research training, view student profiles etc.
Research
Our Research
Publications
- Download publications from Lancaster's Publications Repository.
- Recent Books
See also
- Business and Enterprise
- Knowledge Transfer
Business & Enterprise
Business and Enterprise
See also
- Research
- Knowledge Transfer
News & Events
FASS Events
- All Forthcoming Events
- Events Archive
FASS News
- Keep up-to-date with our News
- View News Archive
FASS Intranet
FASS Intranet
- LU Staff only. Policies/guidelines, funding, research support, committees etc.
- Go to FASS Intranet

You are here: Home >

Events

News

Subscribe to News and Events

LRDG: Internet forum as community of practice and as political voice: Researching Mumsnet

Date: 8 November 2011 Time: 1 - 2 pm

Venue: C89, County South

Karin Tusting (Lancaster University):

Mumsnet is a UK parenting forum which attracts 20,000 posts a day.Many aspects of this site are potentially of interest to New Literacies research. For a start, there is its distinctive community identity.Practices signalling 'fluffiness' are resisted, while practices such as swearing and robust discussion, frowned upon by competing sites, are actively encouraged.The old-school, single-modality appearance of the site, made up of text and a few static emoticons, is part of this 'spikier' identity, which is explicit, self-reflexive, and often discussed. In addition being a distinctive community of practice, Mumsnet has more recently become a force in the public sphere.As a site thought to give access to a key 'floating voter' electoral demographic, engagement on Mumsnet has become a necessary part of political campaigning and activity.Every major party leader participated in a Mumsnet webchat before the last election.The site also runs its own campaigns, and discussions occasionally have the power to shape the news agenda.

This paper will discuss Mumsnet both as a self-reflexive community and as a voice in the public sphere.There is potentially great value in approaching analysis of these issues by drawing on literacy studies perspectives and methodologies, particularly ethnographically-informed participant-observation.However, this raises significant ethical and methodological questions.These include participants' understandings of the nature of their postings on an (admittedly public) site; difficulties around anonymising participants; and the particular personal and relational challenges associated with participant-observation in a community in which I have been participating not as a researcher for several years.This paper will address the ethical and personal dilemmas that this raises.

Event website: http://www.literacy.lancs.ac.uk/lrdg/2011-12.htm

Contact:

Who can attend: Anyone