A genealogy of communicative affordances and activist self-mediation practices

Abstract

In this chapter, the focus is on the various ways in which activists across time and space have appropriated traditional media – print cultures, audio, and broadcasting – as well as telecommunication and the internet to develop resistance practices. I present a historical dimension and discuss the various ways in which counter-cultures and activists have shaped information and communication technologies into tools of resistance to suit their particular needs. As such, a conceptual connection is made between the self-mediation practices of activists, communicative affordances, and the mediation opportunity structure. Across various media and communication technologies, a set of affordances which enable activist mediation practices are identified. These affordances are situated at the level of i) temporality – linked to the affordances of asynchronous and real-time communicative practices; ii) spatiality – related to the affordance of media and communication technologies to collapse distance, as well as to enable both private and public communicative practices; and iii) resistance – implicating the affordance to circumvent state-imposed limitations and to hack and shape technologies. It is concluded that while the Empire always strikes back, new affordances will be discovered, and new creative workarounds imagined, rejuvenating old practices as well as constituting new ones.