Shitposting as public pedagogy

Abstract

In response to the growing ubiquity of social media, critical media literacy scholars have increasingly called for the examination of online practices and their embedded pedagogies and curricula. In response, I use this paper to reimagine shitposting, a discursive social media practice, as a form of public pedagogy aligned (at times) with critical media literacy education. I begin by engaging extant research to both define shitposting and position the practice beyond the neofascist ends of the alt-right movement that most scholars focus on. Examining this alignment through the lens of critical media literacy, I argue that shitposting exists as an online pedagogical technology that can potentially reorient the network of relationships within social media spheres and expand the possible range of identities for those involved. To illustrate this argument, I conclude with a close reading of posts from two Twitter accounts: dril, an anonymous user who has managed to inform political discourse through his shitposts, and the corporate account for the Sunny Delight Beverage Corporation. I describe how tweets from these accounts engage shitposts in divergent ways. In doing so, I contend that these tweets reveal shitposting’s potential for contributing to the democratic aims of critical media literacy education, but the appropriation of that practice by large corporations and individuals imbued with political power jeopardize that already fraught potential.