GARDENING CYBERSPACE - hybrid spaces and social media in the creation of food citizenship in the Bristol city region. Matt will be presenting this at the ESRS Conference in Florence http://www.florenceesrs2013.com/

1. GARDENING CYBERSPACE - hybrid
spaces and social media in the creation of
food citizenship in the Bristol city region
Matt Reed*, Nigel Curry, Dan Keech,
James Kirwan and Damian Maye
Friday, 19 July 13

2. Outline
On-line politics & urban social integration
Methods and materials
Discourses - civic environmentalism and green
urbanism
Conclusions
Friday, 19 July 13

3. Bristol, April 2011
Series of riots around a Tesco Express store
mural photograph - http://capturingbanksy.wordpress.com/2011/04/23/the-not-so-mild-mild-west/
Friday, 19 July 13

4. On-line media and activism
Riot widely reported on social media - streamed live on
the internet
Bennett - personalised politics and DNA (Digital
Network Activism
Castells “In our society, the public space of the social
movement is constructed as a hybrid space between the
Internet social networks and the occupied urban
space: connecting cyberspace and urban space in
relentless interaction, constituting, technologically and
culturally, instant communities oftransformative
practice” (Castells 2012:11)
Friday, 19 July 13

5. Urban & on-line
Urban institutions - “building society across lines of
difference” (Marwell & McQuarrie 2013:127)
Kang - boycott of Wholefoods “the network holds
potential for transforming politics, as a space in which
competing views probe each other, collectively generate
critical reflections on the ethics of a corporation and of
public policy, and so rejuvenate the community (Kang
2012:574)
Capacity of on-line to shape and create a debate, to
change the spaces of the city.
Friday, 19 July 13

6. 4 YouTube Videos
Mostly through Twitter
links.
34 Cases
Methods & Materials
Individuals,
businesses and
organisations -
websites and
linked social
media
8 Twitter accounts
Over 15,000
tweets
1 Facebook
Group
Materials
collected Dec
2012 - April
2013
Analyzed
using Nvivo 10
Friday, 19 July 13

7. Keywords
Keywords used
as coding key
Importance
location,
positive tone
and the
immediate
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8. Ecosystems and resources, People, Cities
Mutual enterprises
Popular mobilization – volunteers, professionals
and shoppers
Environmental Citizenship
Contingency of natural systems
Agents & their motives
Transition and collapse
Power of positive choices
Local action
GREEN URBANISM
Basic Entities Recognised
Exploitation, Co-operation
Assumptions about natural relationships
Metaphors & rhetorical devices
Friday, 19 July 13

9. CIVIC ENVIRONMENTALISM
Basic Entities Recognized
Ecosystems, Regulations and Resources
Businesses, households and the State
Assumptions about natural relationships
Regulated competition
Agents & their motives
Consumers
Corporations
Enlightened self-interest
Key metaphors & rhetorical devices
Cycles – natural and of mutual benefit
Service provision
Technological/logistical solutions
Efficiency
Friday, 19 July 13

10. Conclusion
An alliance within the City - limited & negotiated
Social media - maintaining and sustaining alliance
Combination of on-line and off-line
Reshaping of the space of City
Pattern of inclusion and exclusion
Limitations of the local state
Friday, 19 July 13

11. Matt Reed - mreed@glos.ac.uk
@ReedMtweet
www.ccri.ac.uk
Friday, 19 July 13