Wichita "Twitters" about the 2008 Presidential election: Fantasy theme analysis of messages during three election night time phases.

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Issue Date
2009-05-01
Authors
Rozzell, Bobby L.
Advisor
Citation

Rozzell, Bobby L.(2009). Wichita "Twitters" about the 2008 Presidential Election: Fantasy Theme Analysis of Messages During Three Election Night Time Phases. In Proceedings: 5th Annual Symposium: Graduate Research and Scholarly Projects. Wichita, KS: Wichita State University, p. 152-153

Abstract

The internet application Twitter, according to a description from its website is, "A free social messaging utility for staying connected in real time."[1] The number of users is estimated at more than one million. An average of three million messages is exchanged each day. This study, grounded in Ernst Bormann's Symbolic Convergence Theory (SCT) [2], will utilize Glazer and Strauss's (1967) constant comparative method [3] to analyze the themes that emerged in Twitter posts generated in Wichita, Kansas and the surrounding area (20 mile radius) for three time periods on election night November 4, 2008: three hours before John McCain's concession speech, the time period between the beginning of McCain's concession and the end of Barack Obama's acceptance speech, and 3 hours after the close of Obama's acceptance speech [1]. Analysis will emphasize themes that caught on and chained out through the three time periods.

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Description
Paper presented to the 5th Annual Symposium on Graduate Research and Scholarly Projects (GRASP) held at the Hughes Metropolitan Complex, Wichita State University, May 1, 2009.
Research completed at the Elliott School of Communication
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