Polyphonic Voices and Sphericules of Truth in the Digital Age

• In Event: The Ambivalence of Voice

Abstract

In this presentation we argue that in Social Network Sites, 'authenticity from bellow' (Coupland, 2001), performed by users via experiential and non-institutional discursive actions, excel all other means for legitimizing claims for truth. Users' personal assertions, views and experiences are embedded in diffused ecologies of information, flooding them with competing facts, frames and narratives. In such polyphonic digital environments, selectivity of voices is made on the ground of political affiliation, resulting in echo chambers wherein truth has many faces. In each digital public sphericule (Gittlin, 1998), facts that are grounded in an 'authenticity from bellow' legitimizing logic are upgraded to the status of validity claims, but confronted, rebuffed and refuted in other digital and traditional sphericules (news-media included) as fake-news, alternative facts or conspiracies. This process and its ethical implications is demonstrated and discussed.

Coupland, N. (2001). Stylization, authenticity and TV news review. Discourse Studies, 3(4), 413-442.
Gitlin, T. (1998) 'Public Sphere or Public Sphericules?' in T. Liebes and J. Curran (eds) Media, Ritual and Identity, pp. 175-202. London: Routledge

Authors

• Zohar Kampf, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

• Christian Baden, Hebrew U of Jerusalem