[Commlist] New Issue 12.2 of the Journal of Arab Media Research published

I am pleased to announce the publication of Issue 12.2 of the /Journal 
of Arab and Muslim Media Research/ (JAMMR) which has an interesting line 
up of timely papers. The journal is an international refereed academic 
platform, published by Intellect in the UK. You may access the papers of 
this issue as well as other issues from the JAMMR’s homepage.

https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-of-arab-muslim-media-research

I am hoping you will find this publication a valuable resource for 
research about media, communication and society in the Arab World and 
the Middle East.

*__*

*_Issue: 12.2-_*

Volume (12): Issue (2); December 2019.

*A new transnational arena? An analysis of cross-border web traffic 
towards professional online news sites in the Arab world*

  * Authors: Andrea Haeuptli
    <https://www.intellectbooks.com/andrea-haeuptli>
  * Page: 145-167
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00001_1
*Abstract*

In recent years, Arab news industries have been confronted with an 
unparalleled increase in demand for journalistic offers. In parallel, 
Internet penetration throughout the Arab world has increased 
significantly, leading to a shift of consumption away from traditional 
channels towards the digital realm. This paper addresses the impact of 
those recent developments on a shared transnational communicative arena 
throughout the Arab world. It includes geographically disaggregated 
traffic data of 630 inductively collected professional online news 
sources. Using a network analysis approach, it has been assessed that 
indeed, cross-border consumption of professional online news is a common 
and general feature in the region. Traffic flows between the countries 
are highly diversified without patterns of sub-segmentation. At the same 
time, the strength of traffic flows reflects the traditional leading 
role of the media industries in the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Saudi 
Arabia and Qatar. Yet, weaker traffic flows between the other Arab 
countries are common and diverse, leading to a high over-all integration 
of the Arab transnational communicative arena within the digital realm.

**

*Digitally mediated martyrdom: The role of the visual in political Arab 
activist culture*

  * Authors: Kelly Lewis <https://www.intellectbooks.com/kelly-lewis>
  * Page: 169-189
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00002_1
*Abstract***

Digitally mediated images depicting death and martyrdom as a trope of 
resistance and contestation against oppressive regimes emerged as 
recurring and critical instruments of dissent during the Arab uprisings 
of 2010-11. While the trope of death and martyrdom as a form of 
political expression and resistance is not a new phenomenon in the 
Middle East, the affordances of digital and social media technologies 
have brought forth new opportunities for activists and everyday citizens 
to construct, circulate, and communicate martyr narratives. Drawing from 
literature in visual politics, digital activist culture, and media and 
communication, this textual and iconographical analysis of visual tropes 
focuses on the brutal killing of Egyptian youth Khaled Said, on his 
construction as a posthumous injustice symbol, and on his subsequent 
transformation as a martyr of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Activists 
and everyday citizens participated in symbolically resurrecting Said 
/in/ and /through/ digitally mediated images and transforming him into a 
martyr to represent the popular struggle for social justice and 
universal human rights. The article examines how Said is /made a martyr/ 
through complex creative processes of recurrent visual appropriation, 
mediation, re-appropriation, and remediation. It shows that the creative 
authorship of martyrdom is increasingly hybridised, decentralised, and 
driven by a memetic protest dynamic. The article proposes the term 
/digitally mediated martyrdom/ to designate the emergence of a new kind 
of visually-oriented, socially constructed, and ritualised protest 
dynamic. It develops the conceptual framework for understanding 
digitally mediated martyrdom as a contemporary political practice within 
activist cultures and popular social justice movements. It also argues 
digitally mediated martyrdom represents the emergence of a new and 
transnational protest dynamic.

**

*Social media and power in the Arab world: From dominant ideology to 
popular agency*

  * Authors: Mazhar Al-Zo’by
    <https://www.intellectbooks.com/mazhar-al-zoby>
  * Page: 191-211
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00003_1
*Abstract: *

Conceptualizing the social and political possibilities of digital mass 
mediated communication in modern societies has generated a critical 
debate, ranging from proponents who conceive of its promising profound 
potential to skeptics who dismiss it as a trivial socio-political 
vacuity. For some observers in the field, social media has been 
mobilized to maintain hegemonic structures through a ‘weaponization’ of 
popular narratives on behalf of the dominant political elite. For 
others, social media discourse has signaled the end of grand narratives 
of political ideology, and has ultimately ushered in the age of 
subjective digital narcissism not unlike that of consumer culture in 
late capitalist societies. Beyond these two broader frameworks of 
inquiry, this paper seeks to investigate the critical agency, popular 
sovereignty, and transformative possibilities in socio-digital discourse 
in the modern Arab Gulf region. Recognizing the dominant and residual 
ideology within social media narratives, the paper deploys Raymond 
Williams’ critical and insightful concept of   ‘structures of feeling’  
in order to critically assess the alternative emergent collective 
expressions that diverge from,  yet respond to, hegemonic and dominant 
discourse. One of the main goals of this paper, therefore, is to go 
beyond the conventional analysis of “utopian versus dystopian” binary 
instumentalization of social media in the region, to challenge the claim 
that media (both as technology and technique) determine social and 
political consciousness. More specifically, and in contrast to McLuhan’s 
famed dictum that ‘the medium is the message’, this papers contends that 
digital and social media virtues and contributions are not confined to 
the instrumental communication that serves practical purposes. Rather, 
and more fundamentally, digital and social media involve the practices 
and lived experiences of individuals, culture and society, especially 
those that constitute the formations of collective and emergent identities.

*Redefining #YourAverageMuslim woman: Muslim female digital activism on 
social media*

  * Authors: Inaash Islam <https://www.intellectbooks.com/inaash-islam>
  * Page: 213-233
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00004_1
*Abstract: *

Orientalist discourses have largely shaped how Muslim women have come to 
be represented in western visual media as oppressed, subjugated, or 
foreign. However, with the advent of social media platforms, Muslim 
women are utilizing social media spaces to rearticulate the controlling 
images promulgated through orientalist narratives. This article examines 
the complex relationship visual media shares with Muslim women, and 
demonstrates that the lens of orientalism continues to structure the 
imaginaries that shape visual representations of Muslim women in art, 
news and film. This paper addresses how visual platforms and social 
media spaces such as YouTube, are being utilized by Muslim women to 
undertake digital activism that seeks to subvert essentialist 
narratives. At the center of this discussion  is YouTuber Dina Tokio’s 
2017 documentary, titled “#YourAverageMuslim,” which tackles western 
preconceived notions, and instead offers a redefined version of the 
‘Muslim woman’ predicated on resisting three narratives: 1) 
Muslim-Woman-As-Oppressed 2) Muslim-Woman-As-Subjugated, and 3) 
Muslim-Woman-As-Foreign-Other. This documentary clearly demonstrates how 
Muslim women are using social media platforms in specific ways to shape 
the discourses around Muslim women. In doing so they are demonstrating 
their agentic capabilities, taking control of their representations, and 
speaking for themselves instead of being spoken for by others.

*Beyond the ‘online’: Iranian women’s non-movement of resistance*

  * Authors: Helia Asgari <https://www.intellectbooks.com/helia-asgari>,
    Katharine Sarikakis
    <https://www.intellectbooks.com/katharine-sarikakis>
  * Page: 235-252
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00005_1
*Abstract*

In many undemocratic countries where conservative law and patriarchal 
ideas are in place, women are considered second-class citizens 
particularly in domains of public life. After Iran’s Islamic revolution, 
Iranian women were confronted with a theocratic regime, which imposed 
laws and norms, which limited women’s activities and violated earned 
liberties.

The activities of women under non-democratic states and patriarchal 
systems are thwarted by the repressive measures of authoritarian states 
as well as patriarchal society and hostile attitudes of ordinary men and 
women. New normative frameworks and practices imposed gender segregation 
in various aspects. During these years, women attempt to resist these 
policies, not by deliberate organized campaigns but through daily 
practices in public life. Asef Bayat calls these kind of resistance and 
activities “social non-movement”.

This article focuses on a rather under-researched form of social 
activism and attempts to describe the way in which social media might be 
supportive tools for women aiming to build active networks and 
communicative spaces to deliberate on challenges to their lives. At the 
same time, these spaces function as the civic training ground where 
representations of political demands for social change put forth. This 
article discusses ways in which social media have been used as platforms 
where women’s demands, among others, hold identity dimensions as well as 
violation of their basic and human rights.

*Ikhwanweb: A digital archive for a post-Islamist movement?*

  * Authors: Paolo d’Urbano <https://www.intellectbooks.com/paolo-durbano>
  * Page: 253-272
  * DOI: 10.1386/jammr_00006_1
*Abstract:*

The paper looks at /Ikhwanweb/, the English website of the Egyptian 
Muslim Brotherhood (MB), from its early days and through the years 
before the 25th January revolution. The archive is used as a theoretical 
concept to capture both the symbolic and material struggles that the MB 
faced while trying to articulate its political vision. As a nodal point 
where power and knowledge intersect, the concept of archive was first 
theorised by Foucault and Derrida. /Ikhwanweb/is examined as a digital 
archive, a site for both knowledge and memory production. The first 
section deals with the main analytical concept; the second tells the 
troubled history of the material infrastructure required to run the 
website. Then two main threads are identified and examined. The need to 
distantiate the organisation from political violence and that of 
reaching out ‘the West’ shaped the content of /Ikhwanweb/. The website 
also allowed the group to interact directly with policy-making circles 
and research institutions. Can this be said to be part of that process 
Bayat calls post-islamism? The concluding section reflects on this 
question and suggests a more ambivalent picture.


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