This page is home to background information on the movement against sexual misconduct and assault or, the #MeToo movement, as well as an overview of my research. Below you will find this thesis' abstract, introduction to the thesis components, the goals & objectives and various methodologies for each aspect of this project.

#MeToo on Twitter

The above graph is part of an article by Riley Griffin, Hannah Recht and Jeff Green titled "#MeToo: One Year Later" from Bloomgberg. The graph shows daily Twitter mentions beginning in October 2017, when Alyssa Milano first tweeted "#MeToo". This graph does not take into account the historical relevance of #MeToo, as it had first been coined 11 years earlier by activist Tarana Burke. More background on the origins of "me too." are mentioned in my in-depth story.

ABSTRACT

The movement against sexual misconduct and assault, or the "me too. movement" rapidly made its way through the entertainment industry, leading to the birth of organizations like “Times Up,” and heightened exposure to others such as "It's On Us" and "RAINN". In many cases, these nonprofits have partnered with entertainers to spread awareness for the cause. Through the use of influencer marketing, people like FLETCHER and Kesha have been able to share their personal experiences with the issue of sexaul assault through their music while also teaming up with associated nonprofits to encourage their followers to get involved in the cause. This thesis will not only examine how these partnerships are formed, what kind of change occurs (if any) and to what extent social media acts as a catalyst for influencer-driven change, but also determine what attitudes exist about the movement against sexual misconduct and assault and where/how those conversations take place on social media.

INTRODUCTON

THESIS COMPONENTS

In-depth story: The first element of this thesis is the in-depth, journalistic-style story that describes how and why these partnerships form, what it means for the artist and how it all affects the public. Having collected the survey data and analyzed the selected case studies in the fall of 2018, it was important to synthesize all elements of this work into one, cohesive piece. As a former journalist, the qualitative aspect of this story was just as important as the quantitative and it became clear that there were stories to tell that extended well beyond numbers on a page or bars on a graph.

Survey data and analysis: The second component of this thesis was a survey that analyzed the public’s attitudes and online participation as it pertains to the movement against sexual misconduct assault. The survey received over 500 participants from UConn and beyond. An advertisement of the survey was posted to Instagram and Twitter in order to garner more participants.

Case studies: The case study work was, by far, the most challenging aspect of this thesis as social media analysis can be objective and there is no way to determine sales/campaign effect simply by looking at the likes on a post. The data for this aspect of the thesis was gathered using Talkwalker, a social media analytics platform. One of the goals of this component was to determine the lifespan of the campaigns as well as more top-level data such as who is talking about this music, how they feel about the music, and any general themes that the campaigns may have incited.

tailspin (exhibition): “tailspin” is the exhibit that is located in The William Benton Museum of Art in Storrs, CT. It features two interactive components, located within a color-gel lit pink room. The first of which is a 36” monitor that displays this thesis website in order to allow visitors to browse this research before interacting with the second component. The participatory aspect of this exhibit ties in each aspect of this thesis. There are hundreds of mini “social media posts” from Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Among them are 15 different prompts related to this research (e.g. “what is something you wish you could say but don’t?”) that encourages visitors to engage with their vulnerable side. At “tailspin,” a visitor fills out one or more of these cards and hangs them on the flanking walls. In this way, the exhibit is living, breathing and always changing. When the exhibition is over, the cards will be removed from the walls, scanned and hosted on this website so that the archive of posts will continue to inspire future online visitors.

Jacquelines-Thesis.com: I chose to create a website to host all the components of my thesis because of the ability to share this site digitally. After two years of learning web design (and some development along the way as well), I wanted to put those skills to use and create a custom site designed and coded by me. I was also able to host this site in my gallery space at the Benton; though this was not the original intention for creating the site but it has been useful nonetheless. This way, visitors can browse various elements of my thesis before or after contributing to the participatory element of the exhibit.

GOALS & OBJECTIVES

To understand the attitudes around the movement against sexual misconduct and assault
To examine how people interact with the movement on social media
To illustrate how and why partnerships between singers & non-profits form
To give people the opportunity to participate in an ongoing artifact related to this research
To honor the history of "me too." and its inception, remain sensitive to the stories shared with me during my research process, and present this thesis in a way that is as informative as it is compassionate.

METHODOLOGY

IN-DEPTH STORY

It was important that when writing the in-depth portion of this thesis that there was a well-rounded perspective on these issues. This story is bigger than just singers and non-profits. It’s more than just the music industry and the leaders of the movement against sexual misconduct and assault. Other actors are important to this story: mental health professionals, brand partnership agents and, most importantly, public opinion. The methodology behind the qualitative aspect of this research was intentionally designed to give as full of a picture as possible, during the seven-ish months in which this project was developed.

SURVEY DATA & ANALYSIS

The “data” portion of this thesis was collected using a survey that received close to 500 responses. It was constructed using the platform Qualtrics and distributed using UConn’s listserv, social media advertising and word of mouth. There were no demographic, geographic or psychographic limits placed on this survey as there are no limits placed on those who have a relevant perspective on the movement against sexual misconduct and assault

The language “movement against sexual misconduct and assault” was used in replacement of the “me too. movement” or even the “movement against sexual violence” as not all sexual misconduct is violent and the “me too. movement” started in 2006 with a mission that differs from what it represents now. When founder Tarana Burke started the movement, it was intended to be a place for women of color from low-wealth communities to share their experiences of sexual harassment and assault. Since October of 2017, it has been used in reference to folks of all demographic backgrounds who have experienced sexual misconduct or assault, gender discrimination or intimate partner violence. Because of the breadth of the meaning of “me too.” the language “movement against sexual misconduct and assault” was used to narrow the focus of the research.

Questions in this survey ranged from multiple choice, multiple response, ranking questions, Likert matrix and fill in the blank. The beginning part of the survey probes at the participant’s political and issue-based affiliations. The second part asks the participants to determine where they saw news about the movement both on social media and otherwise. The third part asks if and where the participant has interacted with the movement in person and/or online. The fourth part uses a Likert scale to determine the participant’s attitudes and opinions about the movement and its affiliated issues. The fifth part asks the participant about involvement and activism within the movement and the final component asks various demographic questions (age, gender identity, race).

The two fill in the blank questions in this survey were found at the end. The two prompts were “what is your gender identity?” and “what is your race?”. These questions were left open-ended in an attempt to avoiding “othering” respondents by asking them to select an answer that did not truly represent their identity (e.g. responses for “what is your gender identity” are typically listed in a multiple choice format and include “male,” “female” and “other” with an option to fill in what “other” represents to that respondent.). By leaving the questions open-ended it allowed for respondents to identify themselves as who they are, not attempt to fit themselves into the mold of the survey. In this way, however, it forced the researcher to categorize the qualitative responses in a way that allowed the data to be cross referenced with other questions (i.e. “what is your gender” and “are you registered to vote?”). This was done by assigning a tag to responses that fell into the same category (i.e. women, she/her, cisgender woman, female, F were all selected as “Female”). Responses that fell outside of “Male” and “Female” were categorized as “Other” and the distinctions within that category are listed in the appendix.

CASE STUDIES

FLETCHER’S “I Believe You” was written and dedicated to the victims and survivors of sexual misconduct and assault. This case study was selected because of its unique message and partnership with “Time’s Up” and “It’s On Us.”

KESHA’S “Praying” was selected as one of the case studies because of its popularity in recent American culture; Kesha’s then ongoing lawsuit and experience with producer Dr. Luke is said to be the inspiration for this song. The partnership between Kesha and various organizations through the marketing of this song made it a good fit for this research.

JESSICA LÁ REL’S “After War” is a song Lá Rel wrote about wanting to pin hope into her own heart after her experience with sexual assault. Her partnership with “me too.” and voice in the movement is a cornerstone of this research. Lá Rel's partnership is not part of the dedicated "case studies" page as the relationship between her music and "me too." did not produce social media traffic. It is, however, explained at length in the "in-depth" portion of this thesis.

EXHIBITION: tailspin

The inception of "tailspin" occured during December of 2018 after considering how best to show this research in an exhibition. I began by considering what were the most influential components of my research and determined the following: social media, participation and anonymity were what I wanted to highlight in my exhibit. The space I created needed to allow people to share their experience with these issues while still being able to protect themselves so as not to incite any re-traumatization (the "re-traumatizing" of victims was a common theme that kept reappearing in my research).

After I decided I wanted a participatory exhibit, I looked to the social media component of my research. After working through the data collected in my survey, I was able to conclude that Facebook, Twitter and Instagram were the most commonly used platforms; knowing this, I chose those three platforms to focus on for this space. Then it was a matter of choosing how I wanted people to participate and how I would tie the rest of my research into that participation.

I settled on 16 questions that were related to my research in various ways. Those prompts are listed below.

Describe a time you felt a celebrity spoke directly to you
Something I wish I could say but don’t
Who, or what, inspired you to tell your story?
I will come forward when:
The movement against sexual misconduct and assault made me feel:
Songs about sexual violence are:
What stands in my way is...
Who is an influencer that inspires you?
Which song made you feel strong again?
What’s something you wish you could tell your artistic hero?
Among all the reports of sexual violence, I felt most affected by:
Who saved you?
What I wish I could tell him/her/them:
Social media posts about sexual violence make me feel:
All this data makes me feel...
How I healed:

The prompts were embedded into social media posts in an attempt to feel native to its space. For example, when a user wants to post a Facebook status, they are greeted by a prompt that says "what's on your mind?" On the posts I created, the prompt was written in place of Facebook's default question. This was the case for Twitter as well. On Instagram, I chose to host the prompt in the post itself because had the prompt been written, for example, on the caption line, the participant may not have known to respond in the above space.

The exerience of the exhibit is supposed to feel intimate in that the responses posted on the walls are done so anonymously; there is no prompt that asks for an identification. The people who visit the space can submit a response on their own time; when someone is in the space with them or when they are alone. I did not want to create a space that limits the time in which a visitor can contribute.

Since tailspin's isntallation, the space has seen close to 100 responses. It has been a gratifying experience to see a space materialize they way I had enivision it in my head. I am thankful beyond words not only to those who have contributed to the space but also those who have been vulnerable and open with their submissions.