HLVK13001U Platformed Cultures: Influencers, Followers and Digital Media Production

Over the past decade, scholarly attention was significantly focused on the impact and governance of digital platforms and their effects on culture and cultural production. One phenomenon lies at the heart of current debates around the platformisation of culture: the rise of influencers. The figure of the “influencer” has taken over media reports across the world. Suddenly, digital content creators appear on TV, in newspapers and magazines, significantly shaping conversations on topics as diverse as politics, sustainable lifestyles, video games or how to raise children. Content creators are responsible for the emergence of new forms of cultural production happening on, across and beyond platforms. Moreover, the industry behind influencers has become a social media economy of its own, with enormous revenues in marketing and advertising. This course aims to give an introduction into the world of influencers as well as the platformed cultures that emerge through content creation. The course is divided into two parts.

The first part of this course takes a more theoretical approach to the study of platformed cultures and aims to give the students a better understanding of platforms and their role in our society with a particular focus on social media platforms, influencers and content creation. Throughout the six weeks, we will study platforms with the aim of better understanding what platforms are, how they operate, and how these platforms have given rise to new modes of creative expression and social media influencers, as well as how these new technological and cultural phenomena are changing our society and culture. The final week of this part of the course will be centered around a methods workshop where students will be introduced to different methods for researching digital platforms, content and related issues. Here the students will also begin the initial preparations for their exam projects. 

In the second part of the course, we will further explore the dependencies between digital content creators, platforms and followers. To this end, concrete case studies are presented to show how questions of gender, race, intersectionality and precariousness are essential to understanding the complicated dynamics of “influencing” across digital platforms. In addition, the course is accompanied by guest lectures to introduce students to current research in the field and to inspire them for their own projects. The final session of the course will be a full-day workshop preparing students for the exams by providing them with individual and peer-feedback.