#HARASSMENT
Harassment in #Egypt is staggering …
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83% women report getting harassed
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2.4% actually report it to police
Twitter breaking down the cultural taboo of talking about harassment
RESEARCH GOALS
• What hashtags are used in discourse related to sexual
harassment occurring in Egypt?
• What do these hashtags reveal about the tweeter?
• What is the purpose of these hashtags?
• What patterns emerge among tweets that reveal a
certain constructed discourse?
• Do hashtags build a community of discourse? What
are the metamessages of those communities?
AMBIENT AFFILIATION: A LINGUISTIC PERSPECTIVE ON TWITTER
MICHELE ZAPPAVIGNA / @SMLINGUIST
“a typographic convention, the hashtag, has extended its
meaning potential to operate as a linguistic marker
referencing the target of evaluation in a tweet … This both
renders the language searchable and is used to upscale
the call to affiliate with values expressed in the tweet. We
are currently witnessing a cultural shift in electronic
discourse from online conversation to such ‘searchable
talk’…‘hashtags’ function as linguistic markers enacting
the following social relation:
METHODOLOGY
 Type of tweet





1. Speech act
2. Retweet
3. Conversational
4. News
5. Admonishment (e.g. #endSH)
 Positive or Negative
 1. Positive
 2. Negative
 3. Neutral
 Type of tweeter




1. Individual
2. News organization
3. NGO
4. Other institutions
 Location of tweeter
 1. In Egypt
 2. Outside of Egypt
 Language




1. English
2. Arabic
3. Diaglossia (Eng+Arab)
4. Other
 Sex of Tweeter
 1. Female
 2. Male
 3. N/A (e.g. organization)
 Nationality of Tweeter
 1. Egyptian
 2. Other Arab country
 3. International, non-Arab Country
TWEET MINING
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Tweetarchivist.com
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Google Reader
#endSH / 513 tweets in archive
RESULTS (LOADING … )
Tweet Archivist #endSH
CONCLUSION (FEWER THAN 140 CHARACTERS)
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How many data points is 2 much? 2 many coded categories?
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Does #endSH automatically mean code 2 (admonishment). What abt multiple codes?
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RTs take up 2 much space … include or not include. Think of Tannen’s constructed
dialogue..
TAKEAWAYS THUS FAR
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For English hashtags, apr. 75% of tweets are in english, the rest Arabic or diglossia
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Arabic Hashtags 99% arabic tweets
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Diglossia use most prevalent with arabic tweet, eng hashtag
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So far most are negative
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Reactions or live reporting of harassment may not be in a hashtag (!)