Adrienne Massanari Associate Professor Communication Studies
- Additional Positions at AU
- CTRL Faculty Fellow in Inclusive Pedagogy, AY 24-25 & 25-26
- Degrees
- PhD, University of Washington
MA, University of Washington
BA, Guilford College - Bio
-
I am an Associate Professor in the Communication Studies division in SOC. My research interests include digital culture, online communities, platform politics, game studies, pop culture, and gender and race online. I am currently accepting undergraduate, MA, and PhD advisees.
My new book for MIT Press (October 2024), , discusses how Silicon Valley鈥檚 culture and politics contributed to the rise of the far-right. My 2015 book, (Peter Lang), explored the unique culture of Reddit.com. My work has appeared in New Media & Society, Feminist Media Studies, Social Media + Society, Journal of Communication, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Journal of Information Technology & Politics, and First Monday. I also serves on the editorial boards for the Journal of Sociotechnical Critique (open-access) and New Review of Hypermedia & Multimedia.
Prior to joining AU, I was Associate Professor in the Department of Communication and affiliate faculty in Gender and Women鈥檚 Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Before joining AU and UIC, I was a faculty member in the School of Communication at Loyola University-Chicago, where I also served as the Director for the Center for Digital Ethics and Policy. I have over ten years of experience working as a user-interface designer, usability consultant, and information architect in corporate and educational settings.
Selected publications
Fox, J., Pearce, K. E., Massanari, A. L., Riles, J. M., Szulc, 艁., Ranjit, Y. S., Trevisan, F., Soriano, C. R. R., Vitak, J., Arora, P., Ahn, S. J., Alper, M., Gambino, A., Gonzalez, C., Lynch, T., Williamson, L. D., & L. Gonzales, A. (2021). Open Science, Closed Doors? Countering Marginalization through an Agenda for Ethical, Inclusive Research in Communication. Journal of Communication, 71(5), 764-784.
Massanari, A. L. (2020). Reddit鈥檚 Alt-Right: Toxic Masculinity, Free Speech, and/r/The_Donald. In M. Zimdars & K. McLeod (Eds.) Fake News: Understanding media and misinformation in the digital age (pp. 179-190).
Massanari, A. L. (2018). Rethinking research ethics, power, and the risk of visibility in the era of the 鈥渁lt-right鈥 gaze. Ethic as method in the era of Big Data (A. Markham & A. Herman, Eds). Special issue of Social Media + Society. Available online:
Massanari, A. L. & Chess, S. (2018). Attack of the 50-Foot Social Justice Warrior: The discursive construction of SJWs in 鈥渁lt-right鈥 media. Online Misogyny (D. Ging & E. Siapera, Eds). Special issue of Feminist Media Studies. Available online:
Massanari, A. L. (2017). 鈥淐ome for the period comics. Stay for the cultural awareness.鈥: Reclaiming the troll identity through feminist humor on Reddit鈥檚 /r/TrollXChromosomes. Feminist Media Studies. Available online:
Massanari, A. L. (2016). Contested play: The culture and politics of Reddit bots. In R. Gehl and M. Bakardjieva鈥檚 (Eds.) Socialbots and their friends: Digital media and the automation of sociality (pp. 110-127). New York: Routledge.
Massanari, A. L. (2015). #Gamergate and The Fappening: How Reddit鈥檚 algorithm, community, and culture support toxic technocultures. New Media & Society. Available online:
Massanari, A. L. (2015). Never Alone (Kisima In艐itchu艐a): Possibilities for participatory game design. Well-Played, 4(3). Available online:
- See Also
- For the Media
- To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.
Teaching
Fall 2024
-
COMM-365 Digital Media and Culture
-
COMM-420 Topics in Mass Media: Pop Culture & Communication
Spring 2025
-
COMM-396 Selected Topics:Non-Recurring: Introduction to Game Studies
-
COMM-480 Popular Culture/Communication