As seen on twitter: African-American rhetorical traditions gone viral

<p>This communication research study identifies the presence of the African-American rhetorical traditions of call-response, signification, tonal semantics, and narrative sequencing used in communication on the online social media network, Twitter. The objective of this study is to provide insight into the culture and community of Twitter. Additionally, the research demonstrates how traditional oral rhetorical traditions survive in the digital world. Over a 15-day period, tweets were collected by the author using a computer screenshot feature. Using a coding rubric, three coders, including the author, coded the collected tweets for the four rhetorical traditions. Resulting from this procedure, the coders concluded the presence of all four African-American rhetorical traditions used by Tweeters, as well as evolved forms of certain traditions. These findings provide evidence of a distinct Twitter community and prompt further research on the transfer of traditional oral rhetoric from offline communities to online communities.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (MA)

Level thesis:degree_level

Open Access Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communication, Media and Theatre Arts

Year dc:date.available

2012

Author dc:creator

• Long, Tiffani

Contributors dc:contributor

• Michael Tew, Ph.D., Chair
• Doris Fields, Ph.D.
• Jack Kay, Ph.D.

• communities
• culture
• rhetoric
• twitter
• online
• language
• Communication
• Communication Technology and New Media
• Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Ethnicity in Communication

Repository record dc:identifier

https://commons.emich.edu/theses/442

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:commons.emich.edu:theses-1811