This book explores how social media is used in South Africa, through a range of case studies exploring various social networking sites and applications.
This volume explores how, over the past decade, social media platforms have deeply penetrated the fabric of everyday life. The author considers South Africans’ use of wearable tech and use of online health and sports tracking systems via mobile phones within the broader context of the digital data economy. The author also focuses on the dating app Tinder, to show how people negotiate and redefine intimacy through the practice of online dating via strategic performances in pursuit of love, sex and intimacy. The book concludes with the use of Facebook and Twitter for social activism (e.g. Fees Must Fall), as well as networked community building as in the case of the #imstaying movement.
This book will be of interest to social media academics and students, as well as anyone interested in social media, politics and cultural life in South Africa.
List of Figures and Tables. Acknowledgements. Chapter 1. Introduction to social media and everyday life in South Africa. Chapter 2. Wearable tech and the qualified self: a sociological analysis of South African Strava users. Chapter 3. Liquid love? South African’s experiences of Tinder. Chapter 4. Social media, space and place: #capetown on Instagram. Chapter 5. (Re)imagining the nation: Facebook, the #imstaying movement and cultural citizenship. Chapter 6. (De)constructing the movement: the social media ecology of #FeesMustFall. Chapter 7. Social media and social movements: the hashtagged activism of #ZumaMustFall. Chapter 8: Twitter, race and social surveillance in the (virtual) public sphere. Index
Biography
Tanja E. Bosch is Associate Professor of Media Studies and Production at the University of Cape Town. She teaches multimedia production, social media, radio studies and research methods.
