Suchergebnisse

By 2019, the Syrian civil war has lasted for nearly eight years and it has created the largest humanitarian crisis since WWII (Achlume, 2015). Using the siege of Aleppo in 2016 as a case study, the author applied a Marxist-humanist theoretical framework and incorporated arts-based research methodology to examine how US news media supports capitalist social relations. The research question for this study was: how do the US media depictions of the siege of Aleppo, Syria in 2016 reflect capitalist social relations? There were three sub-questions that followed: (1) Which elements of the siege of Aleppo in 2016 get the most attention in the specific outlets examined? In what ways do these depictions support the US government and/or corporate interests? (2) What are some of the ways in which Syrian refugees are depicted in the various outlets examined? How and in what ways is US humanitarian policy reflected? How are Syrian's racialized through these depictions? and (3) How are corporate and government interests tied to these media outlets? This study used narrative inquiry, visual analysis, and critical discourse analysis as research methods to discover five major themes found in US news media's reporting on the siege of Aleppo in 2016. The author then examined these five main themes through a Marxist-humanist lens to discover how the US news media, the supposed "gatekeeper" for the public, establishes, maintains, and reinforces an ideology that supported hegemony for the dominant class.

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine social media use and its impacts on first generation students by answering the two questions: how do FGS use social media on college campuses, compared to their peers? How does the use of social media affect their academic experiences?Design/methodology/approachThis qualitative study adopted social capital theory as a sensitizing framework for understanding the social media (SM) use and the resources valued by first-generation students (FGS) and used a revealed causal mapping method to analyze the narratives of 96 informants to identify key constructs and linkages on SM use and perceived outcomes.FindingsThe revealed causal mapping (RCM) analysis revealed nine key constructs that shaped the SM use and academic experience of FGS and their peers. The linkages among the nine constructs: three types of social capital (bridging, family bonding and friend bonding), three types of SM use (social, cognitive and hedonic) and three outcomes (academic support, emotional support and distraction to work) were different between FGS and their peers. Among FGS, SM use and perceptions differed by gender.Originality/valueLeveraging social media is critical for universities to enhance FGS persistence, yet knowledge remains limited. This study showed FGS differed from their counterparts in the SM use and perceptions. Among FGS, the SM use and perceptions differed by gender. The research contributions are: (1) SM technology can empower FGS by building social capital, impacting their academic experiences and psychological well-being and (2) the intersection of gender and student generation status is worth investigation. This paper enriches FGS research by proposing a model of SM use and social capital.