Redesigning Digital Communities: Examining the Repertoires of Practice of Youth Engaged in Co-Constructing Twitch Streams

• In Event: Moscone Center West Roundtable Session 6
  In Roundtable Session: Living and Learning in the Digital Age: Exploring the Tensions and Possibilities of Transmedia Activity

Abstract

Objectives/Purposes
This paper examines the discursive practices and learning outcomes of online gaming streams, focusing on how actors create a sense of community/belonging. “Discursive practices”, here, refer to the “valued practices” (Gutiérrez & Rogoff, 2003) of communication in particular streams that are co-designed by the streamer and viewers to create a sense of community; that is, through a shared history, culture, norms, and values that allow viewers to learn and develop interactional features that become routinized practices of a stream’s community (Wenger, 1998). In focusing on how youth leverage discursive practices around cultural values and norms, this paper seeks to elucidate the connection between the actors of a stream’s activity system and the valued cultural practices, and how those interactions contribute to maintaining a sense of community.

Theoretical Framework
At the center of this paper lies the notions of Community of Practice (Wenger, 1998) with Herring’s model of Computer-Mediated Discourse (2004) to examine how communities are formed in online streams and maintained by interaction. Through Cultural Historical Activity Theory (Engeström, 2001) and the theoretical construct of “repertoires of practice,” I argue that we can better understand streamer/viewers as a cultural group within a stream’s activity system with co-constructed community practices. (Gutiérrez & Rogoff, 2003).

Methods
Chat data was analyzed using computer-mediated discourse analysis (Herrings, 2004) as a way to identify discursive practices that were routine for each stream. By examining the data and using criteria that define a community, specific patterns of communication around cultural norms and values arose that contributed to the focus of this study. The discourse analysis focused on interactions/practices that are expressions of cultural values and norms (Gutiérrez & Rogoff, 2003).

Data
Online chat data from this study is drawn from Twitch streams that belong to different game communities and stream sizes. This data analysis will help surface variations in discursive practices between main-streams and smaller streams with fewer core participants.

Results
The results of this study show that although streams are “moderated by the goals and desires of the streamer” (Pellicone, 2016) there are several actors and interactions that take place between and across the streamer and viewers that co-construct the space and a sense of community. Based on the discourse analysis made on the data collected from various stream types, it appears that streams can form communities of practice. Thus, the specific cultural practices of each stream reside in the history of the streamer/viewers engaging with the cultural values and norms of the group (Gutierrez & Rogoff, 2003).

Significance
This study has implications for exploring the connection between social interactions and community formation in online streaming spaces along with the everyday practices of youth who are engaging in the co-construction of online participatory communities mediated by tools such as Twitch. Moreover, the digitally-mediated communities of practice on Twitch have the potential to inform and improve the development of online education. Lastly, this work positions youth as agentic community builders in their everyday practices rather than passive consumers of community building efforts.

Author

• Sandra Jacobo, University of California - Berkeley