Hossein Kermani: Iranian activism on Twitter during the Women, Life, Freedom Movement [Hybrid Event]

The Global Digital Cultures Research Group in the Department of Digital Humanities at KCL hosts Dr. Hossein Kermani. 

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Please note that this is a hybrid event, which will be held in person in the Embankment Room, Macadam Building, Strand Campus, King's College London, and online via Microsoft Teams. When registering for the event, please select either in-person or online admission. The Microsoft Teams link will be distributed to those who register for online attendance shortly before the event. 

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Epistemic Fallacies in Researching False Information and Incivility in the Global South: An analysis of Iranian activism on Twitter during the Women, Life, Freedom Movement

Research on false information and incivility has been shaped predominantly by concepts and assumptions developed in Western democratic contexts. When applied uncritically to authoritarian settings—particularly during periods of contentious politics—these frameworks produce fundamental epistemic blind spots concerning what can be known, classified, and treated as harmful. Drawing on an analysis of Persian-language Twitter during Iran’s Woman, Life, Freedom movement, this talk examines these limitations and proposes a more context-sensitive conceptual framework. I challenge the conventional focus on misinformation and disinformation as different forms of demonstrably untrue content. This approach presumes that the veracity of a claim can be established and, in distinguishing misinformation from disinformation, that the communicator’s intent can be reliably inferred. In authoritarian information environments, however, political actors strategically suppress evidence, obscure sources, and circulate competing narratives to create conditions in which truth cannot be confidently established. Moreover, accusations of spreading false information become political weapons in their own right. Research must therefore examine not only false claims but also the strategic production of uncertainty and the weaponization of false-information accusations. I also criticize frameworks that focus primarily on hostility directed at protected identity characteristics, such as race, ethnicity, religion, or gender. In authoritarian contexts, citizens may instead be targeted because of their political attitudes, perceived affiliations, or expressions of dissent—forms of hostility that classifications developed in democratic settings often fail to capture. I introduce a tripartite typology encompassing pejorative speech, direct insults, and threats or advocacy of violence. I further propose the concept of resistive incivility to describe uncivil expression employed as a contentious practice against authoritarian power.

Dr Hossein Kermani is a senior researcher at the Political Communication Research Group of the University of Vienna and a Chair of ECPR’s Research Network on Digital Authoritarianism. He is a researcher in political communication and digital media, with a particular focus on digital authoritarianism, misinformation and disinformation, online incivility, and contentious politics. His research examines how political actors, citizens, and media use digital platforms in authoritarian and crisis contexts, with particular expertise on Iran and Persian-language digital communication. His current work addresses deceptive information practices, generative AI, cross-platform political communication, and the methodological and epistemological challenges of studying digital politics beyond Western contexts.

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