DSOC 22A08 - Social Media Journalism

Journalism in the digital age is rapidly changing how the news industry works, with social media platforms converging different traditional mechanisms like print, radio and television under one umbrella of the internet. Today, social media is increasingly also offering alternative and sometimes primary sources of information for news practitioners, policy makers and the general public. In a post-pandemic world, the digital economy has grown exponentially and has shown us news way to interact with the world around us. This course will critically examine, evaluate and demonstrate these aspects of social media and the digital-sphere and explore how journalists and news organizations are using different popular social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and SnapChat today to research, report and disseminate stories. We will study how news brands are created in the digital world using social media, and students will get an opportunity to help build digital platforms. We will also look into analytical tools that are available to assess the effectiveness of social media outreach. We will also focus on how different stakeholders in different parts of the world, for example activists, governments and the public at large, are using social media to interact with the news industry, and what impact users-generated content has on societies today, and how these trends will evolve in the future.

Taha SIDDIQUI

Séminaire

English

Spring 2021-2022

Grading will be divided according to the following percentages: 1°) Class participation: 20% 2°) Assignments: 20% 3°) Research Paper: 25% 4°) Final Project: 35%

At the end of the course, the student is expected to : ● Have in-depth knowledge about the digital journalism industry trends – the evolution, the present market, and the future; ● Comprehensive understanding of how different social media platforms work when it comes to news gathering, dissemination and audience engagement; ● Gain the technical skills to professionally operate various popular social media platforms; ● Build your own professional and personal brands using social media platforms; ● Use analytical tools to assess effectiveness of using social media platforms; ● Understand ethics, and impact of social media usage; ● Learn how governments, activists and other stakeholders use various social media for opinion building, narrative-control and generating debates;