Date of Award
3-25-2022
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Criminal Justice
First Advisor
Robert Lytle
Abstract
Indigenous women experience violence at a disproportionate rate compared to non- Indigenous women. The disproportionate violence has created a crisis commonly referred to as the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) movement. Over the last 15 years, activists, organizations, and families have responded to the lack of political motivation to address the violence by raising awareness on social media. While people communicate via multiple social networks, Twitter is the leading forum for information about the movement and accompanying events such as vigils, walks, and memorials. For this reason, this dissertation explored the Twitter presence of the MMIW social movement. Analysis focused on three critical time periods of the Canadian federal government's response to violence against Indigenous women, which galvanized attention toward MMIW. Tweets (i.e., Twitter postings) were selected and stratified by critical events based on social media patterns on Twitter. The stratified sample produced 720 tweets, which were thematically analyzed (Braun & Clarke, 2006). Three prominent themes emerged through the analysis: 1) an effort to keep MMIW the focus of public attention, 2) increased media portrayals of MMIW, and 3) recommendations to change the state and criminal justice system responses to MMIW. Twitter allowed users to raise awareness of the MMIW crisis by maintaining a consistent narrative about women who rarely make the news, thereby keeping them in the public memory. Increased attention on social media corresponded to greater attention by legacy media who began covering more stories of MMIW and by the prime minister, leading to support for real change in the state systems to prevent violence. Twitter users specifically called for changes in the criminal justice (policing and courts), child welfare, and political systems. The recommendations include: a national action plan to address the violence, implementation of an Indigenous criminal justice system, and curriculum changes. Findings emphasized the important role of public narratives about violence against Indigenous women and how social media can be leveraged for education, activism, and change.
Recommended Citation
Snow, Natalie Michelle, "#MMIW: Framing the Online Presence of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Social Movement" (2022). Theses and Dissertations. 1066.
https://research.ualr.edu/etd/1066
