Latest Module Specifications
Current Academic Year 2025 - 2026
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Description This module explores a broad range of issues relating to gender, sex and sexuality as they are mediated through various aspects of digital culture, from internet pornography and social networking sites to online dating and digital gender politics. Using theoretical frameworks taken from gender/sexuality studies as well as media studies, it explores the impact of recent social, economic and technological developments on sexual behaviour and intimacy, gender politics and sexual identity construction. It also critically considers policy responses to a number of issues of social concern, including pornography, the sexualisation of children, pro-anorexia and sexting. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Learning Outcomes 1. Identify the key changes that have occurred in the (mediated) construction of discourses around gender, sex and sexuality in recent decades, in Ireland and elsewhere 2. Develop an understanding of the technological affordances and algorithmic politics of digital media and their role in shaping communicative practices around sex, gender and sexuality. 3. Apply a range of media studies frameworks to a number of key case studies. 4. Analyse the dynamics and impact of hashtag campaigns, memes and other forms of political communication in the shaping of contemporary gender and sexual politics. 5. Design and produce your own digital/social media campaign to influence social attitudes about sex, gender, sexuality, sexual health, etc. and evaluate the strategy behind - and potential impact of - this campaign in relation to the relevant theoretical literature. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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All module information is indicative and subject to change. For further information,students are advised to refer to the University's Marks and Standards and Programme Specific Regulations at: http://www.dcu.ie/registry/examinations/index.shtml |
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Indicative Content and Learning Activities
What is digital culture? Networked society, digital citizenship, access and digital divides; The algorithmic turn and new theoretical challenges for analysing media and culture - Technological, social and economic determinism - Political economies of digital culture(s) Key shifts in gender politics From feminism to postfeminism, from modernity to postmodernity; From the political to the cultural – debates around identity politics and intersectionality - New and old feminisms, digital feminism Cybernetics, artificial intelligence and posthumanism Erasure of the body? Circuits of disembodiment and reimbodiment; What implications for intimacy and ethics (cybersex, online dating, sexbots)? - What implications for gender and sexual politics and identity Case Study 1: Online dating Mediated intimacy, relationshopping and the commodification of intimacy; Neuroscience, genetics and big data; Mobile dating and hook-up apps: conceptual and methodological frameworks Case Study 2: Online gender politics Gamergate, the Manosphere and MRAs versus SJWs: how did we get here?; Networked affect, affective publics, the politics of emotion, the culture wars - Memes, Campaigns and hashtag politics Case study 3: Online pornography: from social problem to cultural critique...and back to social problem? Cultural, economic, historical and legal contexts; Pornography in the digital economy: produsers, DIY and the collapse of private-public and real-representational boundaries - Theoretical approaches, methodologies, research ethics Case study 4: Pro-anorexia image sharing Technological affordances of social media and online community structures and dynamics Case study 5: Sexting, image sharing and digital ethics Policy responses, safety campaigns and sexual double standards Workshop 1 Creating your own digital campaign Workshop 2 Creating your own digital campaign Class presentations Presentation of campaign ideas | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Indicative Reading List Books: None Articles: None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Other Resources None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||