By Any Media Necessary. Henry Jenkins

networked media to expand the civic domain, even as elite groups seek to constrain the definition of what is “legitimate” in the public arena. For subordinate groups, these spaces of “everyday talk” are crucial for the development of political consciousness, for reinforcing shared cultural norms, and for working out alternatives to the dominant culture’s views of their identities and interests (Harris-Lacewell 2006 4).

      Our focus on fostering change “by any media necessary” is informed by current discussions of transmedia activism and mobilization. Lina Srivastava (n.d.), who originated the concept, defines “transmedia activism” as “a framework that creates social impact by using storytelling by a number of authors who share assets and create content for distribution across multiple forms of media to influence social action.” The Transmedia Activism website argues that transmedia practices may deepen the public discussion over topics of shared concern: “Multiple entry points allow donors, activists, partners and audiences to have a comprehensive and coordinated experience of a complex issue, and co-creation allows increased engagement with an issue and greater movement toward action.”

      Writing in regard to the immigrant rights movement in Los Angeles, Sasha Costanza-Chock (2010) notes important generational differences between older activists who seek to centralize the production and flow of messages and younger activists—including the DREAMers—who want to multiply and diversify both the messages and the channels through which they flow: “Transmedia mobilization thus marks a transition in the role of movement communication from content creation to aggregation, curation, remix and recirculation of rich media texts through networked movement formations” (114). Throughout the book, we will use Costanza-Chock’s term “transmedia mobilization” as more or less interchangeable with the concept of transmedia activism discussed above.

      Transmedia mobilization expands what counts as participation. Because digital media practices can be participatory, transmedia mobilization requires co-creation and collaboration by different actors. Because it is open to participation by the social base of the movement, transmedia mobilization is the key strategic media form for an era of networked social movements. The theory of transmedia mobilization does not view media as apart from, but rather a part of social movement formation. Media, Costanza-Chock argues, is no longer solely serving the purpose of messaging; it also involves “strengthening movement identity formation and outcomes” (115).

      Some forms of media production and participation are designed to help cement bonds within an emerging social movement, creating a context for shared identities or mythologies which, as we will discuss, enables participants to act collectively to achieve their shared social agenda. Drawing on ideas from Robert Putnam and Francis Fukuyama, Sabina Panth (2010) explains:

      Bonding in social capital is referred to as social networks between homogenous groups. Bonding can be valuable for oppressed and marginalized members of the society to band together in groups and networks and support their collective needs.… The shared social norms and cooperative spirit from bonding also provide social safety nets to individuals and groups to protect themselves from external invasion.

      So in the case of undocumented youth, media production helped to connect together a group of dispersed participants who had been forced to hide their common identities and experiences; we will discuss this in terms of the creation of “coming out” videos in Chapter 6. Other media production is designed to reach beyond the counterpublic to identify and educate potential supporters as part of an attempt to shape public opinion, a set of practices more closely associated with Putnam’s “bridging social capital.” As Panth continues, “Bridging allows different groups to share and exchange information, ideas and innovation and builds consensus among the groups representing diverse interests.”

      Historically, social movement players might have chosen different strategies and communication channels to achieve bonding and bridging functions, but the current media environment is increasingly porous. Content produced for one audience and one purpose can easily be accessed in a networked environment by quite different groups, including those hostile to the original intent. danah boyd (2014) and Michael Wesch (2008) describe such occurrences as “context collapse.” Writing about video sharing in the age of YouTube, Wesch explains what happens when a video reaches unintended audiences: “The problem is not lack of context. It is context collapse: an infinite number of contexts collapsing upon one another into that single moment of recording. The images, actions, and words captured by the lens at any moment can be transported to anywhere on the planet and preserved (the performer must assume) for all time.”

      As a consequence of context collapse, language crafted in order to speak to the shared assumptions and norms inside a group are made public to those outside the critical counterpublic, both potential supporters and potential haters. All of the groups we’ve studied grapple with this reality, that an expanded communication capacity can also result in expanding conditions of exposure and vulnerability. Context collapse recurs across the book, but especially in relation to Kony 2012 in Chapter 2 and the play between publicity and privacy as experienced by American Muslim youth in Chapter 4.

      Many groups are now experimenting with what alternative media strategies that empower their supporters to take a more active role in shaping communication flows might look like. Transmedia mobilization is unstable and fluid, shifting tactically in response to changing conditions on the ground. It is highly responsive to the uneven access that participants have to different media platforms, tools, and channels.

      The groups we discuss are differentially situated in terms of their embrace of different media tactics and strategies and of their openness to bottom-up participation in shaping their messages and their circulation. Invisible Children, for example, has a fairly rigidly structured organization; authorized leaders make many key decisions that define IC’s vision and its core tactics. IC actively recruits new members into local chapters that maintain some autonomy from the parent organization. IC actively trains youth leadership to support their activities through summer camps, internships, and local events. And many of these local chapters are affiliated with schools and universities, on the one hand, or churches, on the other (Brough 2012). IC’s media production remains tightly controlled, though there has sometimes been a limited interest in encouraging DIY video-making practices. IC represents transmedia mobilization with a limited model of youth participation but with stronger emphasis on the cultural and social dimensions of politics than a traditional nonprofit might have. IC’s Kony 2012 video circulated via the dispersed network of supporters it had built up over almost ten years of organizing on the ground.

      IC also demonstrates some of the challenges of maintaining a networked organization. As the organization received pushback from other human rights groups, it faced a leadership crisis. IC spokesperson Jason Russell had a highly publicized breakdown and the other national leaders—his longtime friends—circled the wagons. A new generation of leaders stepped up behind the scenes and shaped IC’s response, but it took them a few days to regroup. This delayed response left the more loosely affiliated network members exposed. IC was too centralized and not sufficiently participatory, and knowledge was not adequately dispersed across the network. Ironically—as we discuss in Chapter 2—in the wake of Kony 2012, the organization became more centralized to maximize control over its messaging rather than maximize participation.

      Compare IC with the DREAMer movement (see Chapter 5). The traditional U.S. immigrant rights movement has had elements of both grassroots and institutional mobilization, but it has largely been tied to institutions like labor unions, the Democratic Party, and a range of nonprofit organizations. The traditional movement tends to break down according to ethnic or national boundaries, to be geographically localized, to maintain tight control over its messaging, and to rely on the ethnic media—radio personalities in the case of the Spanish-language communities in Los Angeles (Costanza-Chock 2010). The DREAMer movement marks a shift away from many of these formalized structures. Youth are connecting across nationality and across geographic location through their capacity to mobilize via social media. DREAMers have a dispersed capacity for media production: any participant can—in theory—create and share videos, and, as a consequence, there is much less control over messaging. These less hierarchical structures allow the DREAMer network enormous flexibility to respond to changing conditions (Zimmerman 2012), especially when the struggle shifted from passing a proposed