Ontology of Opposition Online: Representing Antagonistic Structures in the World Wide Web

• In Event: ICA Plenary Interactive Paper/Poster Session I
  In Interactive Paper Session: Philosophy, Theory, and Critique Interactive Poster Session

Abstract

Research on harmonious or cooperative social structures on the Internet is available, and likewise, we find many analyses of particular types of individual and collective conflict behavior online (such as flaming or cyberbullying by individuals, or collective protest behavior). However, we lack a typology of antagonistic structures that exist online, and particularly of the ways they are represented on websites. Social structures can be represented formally (manifestly) or informally (in open verbal or visual forms), or remain latent—a distinction that, in our view, has not received much scholarly attention in the analysis of computer-mediated communication. Based on an interpretative analysis of relational structures and types of acts, we distinguish structural elements that lead us to empirical typologies of antagonistic structures represented online. We finally develop theses why some structures are formally represented more often than others and theorize the consequences of this selective formal representation.

Authors

• Benjamin Kramer, LMU Munich

• Nina Springer, LMU Munich