Exploiting white fear continues to galvanize voters
In a new opinion piece in Scientific American, CITAP faculty Daniel Kreiss, Alice Marwick, and Francesca Tripodi describe how political campaigns against critical race theory (CRT) continue a long tradition of linking racial justice movements to communism as a form of fearmongering. They conclude that effectively countering this disinformation campaign requires going beyond dismissals anti-CRT rhetoric as inaccurate to affirmatively supporting racial justice lessons in classrooms as a matter of equality and justice.
Explore the richness of knowledge captured when whiteness is decentered from mis- and disinformation studies
The bulk of research on mis- and disinformation studies English-language cases and communities—but we know that identity plays an important role in how we consume, interpret, and share information. In a piece for the HKS Misinformation Review, Sarah Nguyen, Rachel Kuo, Madhavi Reddi, Lan Li, and Rachel Moran summarize some early observations from their work studying how mis- and disinformation spread within Asian diasporas. They also offer recommendations for additional research into how false and misleading information circulates in historically marginalized communities.
Participatory-based knowledge-production practices protect conspiracy theories from critical thinking
How does QAnon build and elaborate on its core theory? Alice Marwick and William Partin released a preprint of "Constructing Alternative Facts: Populist Expertise and the QAnon Conspiracy," exploring QAnon as a participatory culture and digging into how Anons build knowledge. What they find builds on Francesca Tripodi’s work on scriptural interference as a form of close reading borrowed from biblical study practices and applied to other texts. In doing so, participants propose new connections and meanings—and reject interpretations that contradict established community knowledge or stretch these practices too far.
The result is a new form of populist expertise complete with its own distinct canon, core texts, and established research practices. Any attempt to counter specific components of the QAnon theory or convince individual participants to leave the community must contend with how these layers of process and participation reinforce the ‘knowledge’ Anons create.