Research Project DATAPUBLICS - Transforming Journalism and Audiences in the age of datafication

Contact

Rie Hovmann Rasmussen // General inquiries // Project coordinator // riehr@ruc.dk
 

Researchers

Jannie Møller Hartley // Project leader & Responsible for subproject 2 // Associate professor // jath@ruc.dk

My subproject investigates how datafication is changing news production and journalistic practices, ideals and self-understandings. Through ethnographic field work in news organisations the subproject focusses on the relations between algorithms and big data in the everyday news-work. The project applies an evolutionary understanding of technological artefacts, for example algorithms, seeing them as value systems and thus narrative discursive spaces for the circulation of symbolic goods, such as journalistic news articles or items.

Mette Bengtsson // Responsible for subproject 4 // Assistent professor //  bengtsson@ruc.dk

My subproject will investigate audiences engagement practices situated in between platform mechanisms and algorithms in a number of case studies. Drawing on a range of qualitative methods, including ethnographic observations (online and offline), interviews and protocol-readings, the subproject explores concrete manifestations of engagement practices as they unfold across multiple contexts such as social media, news media and offline settings.
 

Morten Fischer Sivertsen // Responsible for subproject 3 // PhD student //  msiverts@ruc.dk

My subproject scrutinizes the social structuration of citizens’ (lack of) links to and integration within public life in datafied publics. I use statistical analysis of survey data in order to investigate correlations between social class, media consumption, cultural practices and civic engagement in both offline and online settings. Furthermore, I am exploring how digital methods using Facebook-data can methodologically supplement the more classical survey approach.
 

Lisa Merete Kristensen // Responsible for subproject 1 // Postdoc researcher //  lisak@ruc.dk

My subproject investigates what datafication – in the form of new networked associations between media companies means for the editorial decisions and for publicist business models in a Nordic democratic corporatist media system. In order to explore this, I draw on document analysis as well as conduct qualitative interviews with stakeholders, digital editors and marketing departments inside particularly technologically advanced and innovative newsrooms, both in Denmark and in other countries, in order to explore their usage of data in different practices. The hope is, that the project will deliver a systematic analysis of how ‘hyperscale’ big data networks are solidifying the relationships between platform mechanisms and journalistic media.
 

Anna Schjøtt Hansen // Research Assistant //  anscha@ruc.dk

Tim Gottenborg Bruun Ramsland // Student Assistant //  tgbr@ruc.dk