March 4, 2026
Events
Join us for COMMColloquium Monday, March 23, 2026, 3:00 pm, in 102 Mann Library Building with graduate student Bya Rodrigues (title TBD). The colloquium is followed by a reception located in The Hub of the Department of Communication.
Grants
Associate Professor Andrea Stevenson Won was awarded a $250,000 Collaborative Co-Embodiment for Hybrid Attendance grant from the Sloan Foundation. Andrea serves as Principal Investigator on the project, which builds on existing work in accessibility and remote collaboration by approaching hybrid meetings as an opportunity to combine the social capital and abilities of both in-person and remote participants. The team’s initial system prototype leverages haptic and audio communication between two paired attendees: one on-site and one remote. The on-site attendee represents the remote participant through a videoconferencing interface that allows the remote attendee to be seen and heard by both their host and the on-site audience. The on-site participant also wears small haptic buzzers on their arms that are controlled by the remote attendee, enabling subtle, nonverbal communication through gentle vibrations.
Lectures
On March 10, 2026, graduate student Inhwan Bae and Postdoctoral Associate Han Li will present a hands-on workshop titled Computational Methods for Migration and Xenophobia (Detection Description Experiments). The workshop introduces digital methods for studying xenophobia, combining legal and social context with practical research tools. Han will discuss how to interpret large-scale online hate speech data, while Inhwan will present on designing online experiments to strengthen causal inference. The event will conclude with a discussion on applications, ethical considerations, and key limitations of digital data and tools in this area, featuring additional guest speakers Beth Lyon and Alfonso Indurain.
On February 26, 2026, Associate Professor Brooke Erin Duffy was an invited panelist on “Content Creation and the End of Social Media,” alongside Crystal Abidin and Kelechi Okafor in conversation with Catherine Knight Steele. The event was sponsored by the Digital Inquiry, Speculation, Collaboration, and Optimism Network at the University of Michigan. The public panel explored how engagement farming, influencer culture, misinformation, disinformation, and AI are reshaping social media and the creator economy.
Publications
Graduate students Amanda Vilchez, Sohinee Bera, Professor Bruce Lewenstein & Stephen Hilgartner, February 2026, “Examining Media Coverage of Ethical Dimensions of Advanced Algorithmic Technology,” Public Understanding of Science.
Given the media’s role in shaping imaginaries of emerging technologies and their acceptance, this paper systematically analyzes media discourse on ethics in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data science from 2015 to 2020. Their results show that media coverage of advanced algorithmic technologies mainly focused on the industry sector, frequently addressing short-term challenges such as algorithmic bias, social justice, data privacy, and socioeconomic effects. This study offers a holistic and integrated analysis, highlighting previously overlooked dimensions such as accountability strategies and the relationship between areas of application and their consequences.
Picture Time!
On Monday, March 2, 2026, we celebrated our award-winning faculty and staff. The ceremony took place at the Statler Hotel Ballroom.
