[acc-cca-l] Book Announcement

[Jason Hannan]

[△EXTERNAL]



Jason Hannan, Trolling Ourselves to Death: Democracy in the Age of Social Media (Oxford, 2023)


https://global.oup.com/academic/product/trolling-ourselves-to-death-9780197557778



Discount Code: ASFLYQ6



DESCRIPTION: Almost forty years ago, Neil Postman argued that television had brought about a fundamental transformation to democracy. By turning entertainment into our supreme ideology, television had recreated public discourse in its image and converted democracy into show business. In this book, Jason Hannan argues that social media have brought about a second transformation, this time involving internet trolls. He explores how the trolls have emerged from the cave and now walk in the clear light of day. Trolling has gone mainstream, eroding our public culture and changing the rules of democratic politics. Adding a twist to Postman’s classic thesis, Hannan argues that we are not so much amusing, as trolling ourselves to death.

But how did this come to be? Can we attribute this transformation solely to digital technology? Or are there deeper political, economic, and cultural roots? Trolling Ourselves to Death moves beyond the familiar picture of trolling by recasting it in a broader historical light. It shows how trolling is the logical outcome of a culture of possessive individualism, widespread alienation, mass distrust, and rampant paranoia. Synthesizing media ecology with historical materialism, it explores the disturbing rise of political unreason in the form of mass trolling. It sheds light on the proliferation of disinformation, conspiracy theory, “cancel culture,” and digital violence. Taking inspiration from Robert Brandom’s innovative reading of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, this book makes a case for building “a spirit of trust” to curb the epidemic of mass distrust that feeds the plague of political trolling.



REVIEWS


"When assessing online toxicity, violence, and manipulation, it's tempting to frame each as creatures of the platforms' lagoons: 'new' problems caused by digital technologies. In this provocative analysis, Jason Hannan shows that there are creatures in the lagoon, yes, but those waters are older, murkier, and much more steeped in analog dysfunction than we might care to admit. Identifying these origins is the first and most critical step to understanding how we arrived at such a precarious political moment—and what we can, and must, do next to begin undoing the damage." — Whitney Phillips, author of This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things: Mapping the Relationship between Online Trolling and Mainstream Culture



"Almost forty years after Neil Postman's seminal work, Jason Hannan analyzes the profound problem of a poisoned public sphere in a platform society. His new book offers a deeply insightful analysis of the transformation of online culture, in which trolling, disinformation, and conspiracy theories are increasingly normalized. Essential reading for all teachers and students who believe that education can serve as a civic counteroffensive against the massive pollution of our online channels." — José van Dijck, co-author of The Platform Society: Public Values in a Connective World

"Democracy comes with an abundance of enemies, and lately with trolls. In this engaging read, Jason Hannan historicizes trolling with and without technology and walks us through its impact on civic cultures. This lucid and informed book is a must-read for those curious about what trolling is, why and how it manifests, and how we may survive it." — Zizi Papacharissi, author of After Democracy: Imagining Our Political Future
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