ECIR 2018: Text2Story Workshop-Narrative Extraction from Texts

The 1st International Workshop on Narrative Extraction from Texts (Text2Story 2018) was held in conjunction with the 40th European Conference on Information Retrieval, ECIR 2018, Grenoble on the 26th March 2018. The workshop aimed to help foster the collaboration of researchers on a wide range of multidisciplinary issues related to the text-to-narrative- structure. The program consisted of two keynote talks, six research presentations, a poster session and a slot for demo presentations. This report briefly summarizes the workshop.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Nostalgia and Hope: Intersections between Politics of Culture, Welfare, and Migration in Europe

This open access book shows how the politics of migration affect community building in the 21st century, drawing on both retrogressive and progressive forms of mobilization. It elaborates theoretically and shows empirically how the two master frames of nostalgia and hope are used in local, national and transnational settings, in and outside conventional forms of doing politics. It expands on polarized societal processes and external events relevant for the transformation of European welfare systems and the reproduction of national identities today. It evidences the importance of gender in the narrative use of the master frames of nostalgia and hope, either as an ideological tool for right-wing populist and extreme right retrogressive mobilization or as an essential element of progressive intersectional politics of hope. It uses both comparative and single case studies to address different perspectives, and by means of various methodological approaches, the manner in which the master frames of nostalgia and hope are articulated in the politics of culture, welfare, and migration. The book is organized around three thematic sections whereby the first section deals with right-wing populist party politics across Europe, the second section deals with an articulation of politics beyond party politics by means of retrogressive mobilization, and the third and last section deals with emancipatory initiatives beyond party politics as well

Denmark and Sweden: The Collision Between Welfare State Politics and Immigration

The Scandinavian welfare states of Denmark and Sweden have famously similar socio-political and cultural systems, ones which have advanced the common perception of these nations as united in a common humanitarian and progressive global position. However there exists a significant divergence within either nation’s approach to immigration, asylum and integration policy, one indicative of the deeply ingrained deviations in popular understandings of national belonging and perspectives on greater European and global integration. By contextualizing the historical progressions of either nation and juxtaposing their individual responses to both the 2015 European refugee crisis and the contemporary Ukrainian conflict and resulting refugee crisis, it becomes apparent that these often-merged nations operate within starkly different realms of migration policy. This trend is emblematic of a more isolationist and nativist approach generally adopted in Denmark versus the more liberal and multilateral approach popularized in Sweden

Lebanese Subjectivities and Media Use: Post/Global Contexts

Media use is neither socially determined nor socially determinative outside of subjectivity, the process by which the self makes meaning of its place in the world. To further our understandings of media and social change, this dissertation examines the relationship between Lebanese media use and subjectivities in different times and geographic locations, including within the Lebanese diaspora. It incorporates three case studies, including textual analyses of 1) representations of Syro-Lebanese Oklahoman immigrants in The Oklahoman from 1901 to 1958; 2) discourses on media and communication in the contemporary Lebanese civil war novel; and 3) constructions of journalistic authority within the Lebanese blogosphere during the 2006 Summer Israeli-Hizballah war. Through these case studies, this dissertation investigates how global power is constructed/perpetuated/resisted via existing communication channels and patterns of relating that have been created throughout history

Nostalgia and Hope: Intersections between Politics of Culture, Welfare, and Migration in Europe

This open access book shows how the politics of migration affect community building in the 21st century, drawing on both retrogressive and progressive forms of mobilization. It elaborates theoretically and shows empirically how the two master frames of nostalgia and hope are used in local, national and transnational settings, in and outside conventional forms of doing politics. It expands on polarized societal processes and external events relevant for the transformation of European welfare systems and the reproduction of national identities today. It evidences the importance of gender in the narrative use of the master frames of nostalgia and hope, either as an ideological tool for right-wing populist and extreme right retrogressive mobilization or as an essential element of progressive intersectional politics of hope. It uses both comparative and single case studies to address different perspectives, and by means of various methodological approaches, the manner in which the master frames of nostalgia and hope are articulated in the politics of culture, welfare, and migration. The book is organized around three thematic sections whereby the first section deals with right-wing populist party politics across Europe, the second section deals with an articulation of politics beyond party politics by means of retrogressive mobilization, and the third and last section deals with emancipatory initiatives beyond party politics as well

Unmet goals of tracking: within-track heterogeneity of students' expectations for

Educational systems are often characterized by some form(s) of ability grouping, like tracking. Although substantial variation in the implementation of these practices exists, it is always the aim to improve teaching efficiency by creating homogeneous groups of students in terms of capabilities and performances as well as expected pathways. If students’ expected pathways (university, graduate school, or working) are in line with the goals of tracking, one might presume that these expectations are rather homogeneous within tracks and heterogeneous between tracks. In Flanders (the northern region of Belgium), the educational system consists of four tracks. Many students start out in the most prestigious, academic track. If they fail to gain the necessary credentials, they move to the less esteemed technical and vocational tracks. Therefore, the educational system has been called a 'cascade system'. We presume that this cascade system creates homogeneous expectations in the academic track, though heterogeneous expectations in the technical and vocational tracks. We use data from the International Study of City Youth (ISCY), gathered during the 2013-2014 school year from 2354 pupils of the tenth grade across 30 secondary schools in the city of Ghent, Flanders. Preliminary results suggest that the technical and vocational tracks show more heterogeneity in student’s expectations than the academic track. If tracking does not fulfill the desired goals in some tracks, tracking practices should be questioned as tracking occurs along social and ethnic lines, causing social inequality

The linguistic construction of identity in transnational relocation narratives: Examining discursive practices in expatriate blogs

This research examines the linguistic construction of identity in personal narratives of transnational relocation to England in expatriate blogs. These constitute a form of transition during which individuals engage with who they are. Adopting a sociocultural linguistic approach to identity, the analysis draws on the frameworks of tactics of intersubjectivity (ToI) and membership categorisation analysis (MCA) to show how identity is constructed along the relational dimensions of likeness, realness and power, and how individuals engage in category negotiations throughout their first year abroad. Most commonly, individuals create similarity and difference with regard to both their country of origin and of residence, as well as to other expatriates with whom they share joint foreignness. Less frequently yet more prominently, they authenticate identity, which involves sharing personal experience, displaying expertise, as well as positioning themselves as able to provide unadorned accounts of life abroad and as finding fulfilment through relocation. However, they also denaturalise identity through expressions of rupture, challenges and being out of place. Issues of power revolve around individuals’ process of obtaining necessary documents and of legitimising their blogging. Category negotiation extends from the initial challenge of not yet having moved whilst already sharing relocation narratives, as well as experiencing liminality, to adopting category membership as expatriates, exploring its predicates and challenging non-members’ assumptions. This thesis makes an original contribution to knowledge in two ways: empirically by exploring linguistic identity construction in online transnational relocation narratives, which is relevant for an understanding of how individuals discursively engage with transition more generally, and methodologically and theoretically by employing and critiquing two diverse approaches which to the researcher’s knowledge have not been combined in research on linguistic identity construction. Ultimately, this thesis contributes towards the consideration of how identity and transition can be theorised and investigated using linguistic frameworks

I Could Visit Her Blog Just Because She’s so Stupid : A Study of how Gendered Norms and Discourses Surrounding Girls’ Blogging Habits are Created and how the Girls’ Negotiate Around Them

General introduction This publication is the end product of the Invisible Girl project, an international, Swedish­based and multi­disciplinary research project in which the interplay of power relations, gender, and age was the primary object of study. The project was global in its scope and included researchers and artists from Australia, Canada, Croatia, The Czech Republic, Estonia, India, Israel, Italy, Kenya, Madagascar, Nigeria, Serbia, South Africa, Sweden and The UK. The name of the project is inspired by Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man from 1952. Just like Ellison portrays black Americans as being socially invisible, it is possible to view girls as invisible in the sense that their actions and competences cannot be adequately described with the existing male­normative terminology. Is she made socially and linguistically invisible and not seen as a real person? Another inspiration is the philosophy behind Magritte’s (1929) painting “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” [This is not a pipe], often interpreted as pointing out that the painting is not a pipe but an image of a pipe. The same metaphor illuminates the philosophical essence of the Invisible Girl. When we talk about blogging girls, gamer girls, helpless girls, out­of­control­on­the­internet girls, girls as foolish innocents who invite sexual predation is this girls’ reality or images of it? Are girls hidden in the notion of the gendered “Other”, in the general idea of a girl category?This body of work forms a counter story including the voice of marginalized groups with the explicit aim to challenge privileged discourses. From a normcritical perspective the aim is to question accepted worldviews or implicit agreements about girls, how they are mediated by i.e. images, movies and stories, which produce sexist stereotypes, at different societal levels. Stories, which contradict and present the world from different perspectives, are important for exposing stereotyping practices and how they are developed. The overarching research approach of the Invisible Girl Project is critical and derives from the tension between common notions about girlhood, girls’ own experiences and contemporary research. We suggest that the understanding of the concepts ‘girls’ and ‘girlhood’ are socially constructed and that their associated meanings are continually shaped and re­shaped by social actors in particular situations. Certain historical, social, political, cultural, economic, ethnic, religious and gender values may also inform these meanings. Approaching the invisible girl as a verb rather as a noun this publication may be seen as an exploration of contemporary conditions for how girls become girls and form girl identities. We do not aspire to present a generalized image of The Girl. Providing examples of how to become a girl is an individual experience but also a global phenomenon, the contributions to our publication offer important aspects of what it could mean to become a girl today. What practices are instrumental when girls become girls? And how have these questions been answered in different cultural contexts?.....Excerpt for my chapter:Web blogs and web blogging is a subject of constant debate. Do the blogs change our way of thinking about media and work as a democratic force, or are they simply a waste of time? Why do millions of Swedes want to read about the everyday life of a few spoiled teenage girls? Is the era of the printed word over? In the past few years, all these questions and many others have appeared in different forms in the Swedish mainstream media. This study aims to create a picture of the media climate surrounding girls’ web blogging by examining a number of Swedish news articles concerning blogs, as well as look deeper into how the discourses surrounding this phenomenon are created and prescribed with meaning. I am also interested in how girls understand their blogging practices and relate to contemporary media discourses. Questions about how the bloggers negotiate their understanding of this practice, as well as what gendered norms become visible in their reasoning, will be answered with the help of five girls in a focused group interview. In addition to that, I explore whether feminist standpoints or strategies of resistance can be detected among the girls. As a result of the two different research methods the dynamic power relation between bloggers and mass media becomes visible. This study show how girls are encouraged by a contemporary societal discourse to consume and focus on their appearance, and in doing so creating their own social context, something for which the blog as a medium is well adjusted. On the other hand the girls are invalidated and reprimanded when following the rules of this discourse, as a result of girls’ interests being preconditioned as uninteresting. Mainstream media combines an adult interpretative prerogative which “others” young people, with a focus on the femininely connoted intimacy and subjectivity, which creates a highly derogatory discourse for those who are placed in both constructed categories: young girlsBlogging has, although it exists within a framework of a commercial market, become a major social movement among Swedish girls, where important cultural codes and communities are created. The body of evidence in this study shows how the ever­growing readership and influence over old-style media that blogs retain, while at the same time being defined by the same, points toward a dynamic power relationship where no party is unaffected by the other

Blogging the hyperlocal : the disruption and renegotiation of hegemony in Malta

This thesis examines how blogging is being deployed to disrupt institutional hegemony in Malta. The island state is an example of a hyperlocal context that includes strong political, ecclesiastical and media institutions, advanced take-up of social technologies and a popular culture adjusting to the promise of modernity represented by EU membership. Popular discourse is dominated by political partisanship and advocacy journalism, with Malta being the only European country that permits political parties to directly own broadcasting stations.The primary evidence in this study is derived from an analysis of online texts during an organic crisis that eventually led to a national referendum to consider the introduction of divorce legislation in Malta. Using netnography supplemented by critical discourse analysis, the research identifies a set of strategies bloggers used to resist, challenge and disrupt the discourse of a hegemonic alliance that included the ruling political party, the Roman Catholic Church and their media. The empirical results indicate that blogging in Malta is contributing to the erosion of the Church’s hegemony. Subjects that were previously marginalised as alternative are increasingly finding an online outlet in blog posts, social media networks and commentary on newspaper portals.Nevertheless, a culture of social surveillance together with the natural barriers of size and the permeability of the social web facilitates the appropriation of blogging by political blocs, who remain vigilant to the opportunity of extending their influence in new media to disrupt horizontal networks of information exchange. Blogging is increasingly operating as a component of a hybrid media ecosystem that thrives on reflexive cycles of entertainment: the independent newspaper media, for long an active partner in the hegemonic set up in Malta, are being transformed and rendered more permeable at the same time as their power and influence are being eroded. The study concludes that a new episteme is more likely to emerge through the symbiosis of hybrid media and reflexive waves of networked individualism than systemic, organised attempts at online political disruption

Come, let's wrestle : language and the struggle for authority in online Persian social networking sites

This dissertation builds on prior scholarship in linguistic anthropological studies of performance to examine transnational spaces in online social networks where members of the Iranian diaspora use emerging technologies to interact with one another in ways that highlight the tensions between them. The focal point of this project will be the Facebook page Iranian Vines, which features short (5-15 second long) comedic videos that address issues unique to the experiences of Iranians living in diaspora. While many second-generation Iranians use online spaces to linguistically construct a hybridized identity, first-generation Iranians use these same spaces to evaluate the authenticity of these constructed identities by policing the language used by performers and deciding on the linguistic legitimacy of their performances. I argue that the performative nature of the Iranian Vines page creates a space for first-generation Iranians to respond to global sociolinguistic hierarchies that value English over Persian by acting as gatekeepers of Iranian authenticity through linguistic prescriptivism. Second-generation Iranians, on the other hand, use performance to decontextualize (and thus make visible) the moments of difference that define their particular vantage point and to acquire sociolinguistic capital through humor. These performers use “identity-switching,” a practice in which they juxtapose performances of non-Iranian and Iranian identity for comedic effect to challenge sociolinguistic hierarchies within the Iranian community that value monolingualism or parallel bilingualism. A core focus of this dissertation will be the ways that emerging technologies shape power relations between members of this community by making visible the processes by which members of ethnolinguistic communities negotiate the relationship between identity and language.Middle Eastern Studie