May 27th, 2014 at 12:30pm ET
Berkman Center for Internet & Society, 23 Everett St, 2nd Floor
Since that fateful Youtube video of Mohamed Bouazizi started circulating in Tunisia, people started labeling the 2011 revolutions that sparked across the Arab World as the Facebook and Twitter revolutions. While that is not the case, it is undeniable the role that social media played in those and other revolutions that are emerging across the world. Taking a social networked analysis approach, I will talk about the initial findings of ongoing research being conducted on the Arab Blogosphere and Twitter maps from various countries in the region. This analysis has helped identify key actors in the region (and in some cases the absence of certain actors) in addition to the links between them. It is a fundamental step and a foundational one that will support building a knowledge base and that will help understand the flow of information and conversations -if any- between different activists in the region, while offering a position to study the tactics used by activists in the region to support their cause.
About Dalia
Dalia Othman is a Berkman Fellow and Visiting Scholar at MIT's Center for Civic Media. At Berkman, Dalia has been looking at online civic engagement in the Arab World, focusing on analyzing the Arab Blogosphere and Twitter maps of various countries within the region. She dedicates the rest of her time exploring different themes around digital storytelling and is currently building a resource platform that will help communities tell powerful stories online.
Prior to Berkman, Dalia was an Associate Professor teaching New media at both Bard College- Abu Dis and Birzeit University. She was also the Senior Manager of Community Project at Souktel Inc. - a mobile services company that designs SMS platforms for the aid of local communities across the globe.