Screen and Scenes
Fleeing for Change: Analyzing the Instagram #kaburajadulu Trend as a Form of Political Engagement and Dissatisfaction of Indonesian Diasporas
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Pulung Perbawani
In the past few months, Instagram users of Indonesian nationality have played a crucial role in shaping a growing trend of posts that feature the hashtag #kaburajadulu (translation: let’s flee for now). This trend, which originated as an adverse reaction to the newly inaugurated Indonesian president and vice president, Gen. Prabowo Subijanto and Gibran Rakabumin Raka, has been fueled by the public’s dissatisfaction with the country's policies and situation within the first hundred days of their term. Numerous posts created by Indonesian diasporas worldwide have emerged, filled with critiques and reasons why they chose to depart the country, along with encouragement and information on how fellow Indonesians can and should seize the opportunity to live abroad. This paper analyzes the political context behind the posts under the #kaburajadulu hashtag as a significant form of civic engagement. By conducting a content analysis of high-engagement Instagram reels, this study seeks to understand the language of critics and its role in shaping political discourse in Indonesia. This research enhances our understanding of participation practices and political engagement, particularly in Indonesia, and provides deeper insights into the audience's power to influence political narratives.
Digital Faciality
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Yazan Nasrallah
The face has long been functions as an index of identity, a surface on to which regimes of race, gender and class are inscribed. Building on Levinas’s ethics of the face and Deleuze & Guattari’s concept of the faciality machine, this paper reconceptualises the digital facial image not as a representation but as an operative site where power acts, affects circulate, and subjectivities are modulated. Historically, physiognomy, and biometric photography reduced faces to legible data, reinforcing colonial and racial hierarchies. Contemporary machine-vision systems recode these biases in algorithmic form. Adopting a practice-based methodology, this research develops creative strategies to disrupt the faciality machine. By engaging with generative AI, particularly the diffusion models, this research explores alternative modes of seeing that prioritise sensation over representation, offering new possibilities for ethical and affective engagements with the digital face to articulate what constitutes an ‘ethical face image’ in the era of AI-generated image. By shifting focus from recognition to sensation, and from documentation to emergence, this research rethinks the politics of the digital face image and its implications for contemporary subjectivity.
Screen and Sentiments - Prime-Time TV News Audience in India: A Qualitative Study of Right-wing Viewers and Their Interpretations of News
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Ayushi Chamoli
This study examines how politically aligned viewers in India engage with mainstream televised news narratives. It aims to understand the extent of viewers' critical engagement with politically charged media content as well as their interpretive practices. Addressing contemporary issues such as audience–media relationships and media literacy, the research is positioned within media studies and political communication. Using a qualitative approach, the study combines ethnographic observations with semi-structured interviews. The data were thematically analysed to explore emotional engagement, viewing habits, and perceptions of bias. Preliminary findings suggest that although participants do not report deep emotional attachment to news content, they often express strong agreement or opinions during viewing. Television remains central to their media consumption, driven by routine, trust, and familiarity, even when other media sources are accessible. Participants show a limited and varied understanding of bias, and none reported engaging in fact-checking, though some noted that younger family members occasionally challenge news credibility. The study is limited by its small, geographically constrained sample. Nonetheless, the findings offer insight into the informal, everyday workings of media literacy among ideologically aligned audiences and the internalisation of political narratives.
Digital Strategy of Women’s Weekly Magazines in Japan
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Honoka Kato
This study explores media culture through the lens of tabloid media targeting Asian women, an area that has received limited attention in media studies. Launched around the 1960s, Japanese women’s weekly magazines have provided women with stories, often considered scandalous, of celebrities and the royal family and practical information on beauty, housekeeping, and hobbies, fostering interactivity through reader-submitted content. However, with the rise of digital media, these magazines are finding ways to survive in this era by disseminating information on their own platforms or social media. In fact, they are no longer “weekly” magazines as information is being updated on a daily basis. So, how are Japanese women’s weekly magazines attracting readers and building relationships with them in the digital age? This study analyzes the digital strategies of three current major women’s weekly magazines—"Shukan Josei", "Josei Jishin", and "Josei Seven," focusing on the 1) content and arrangement of information provided online, 2) presence of online pages for reader participation, and 3) differences from the print version of the magazines. Preliminary findings suggest that, while the magazines provide information segmented by theme and aim to attract readers on an article-by-article basis, the interaction with and among readers through the web platform is limited. The magazines maintain their uniqueness as media outlets by emphasizing the traditional uniqueness of women’s weekly magazines, especially information on celebrities and the royal family, which has been inherited from the era of print-only media.