Joan Donovan

Research Director, Shorenstein Center on Media Politics and Public Policy

Twitter: @BostonJoan
Dr. Joan Donovan is the Research Director of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. Dr. Donovan leads the field in examining internet and technology studies, online extremism, media manipulation, and disinformation campaigns.

Dr. Donovan leads The Technology and Social Change Project (TaSC). TaSC explores how media manipulation is a means to control public conversation, derail democracy, and disrupt society. TaSC conducts research, develops methods, and facilitates workshops for journalists, policy makers, technologists, and civil society organizations on how to detect, document, and debunk media manipulation campaigns

Dr. Donovan's research and teaching interests are focused on media manipulation, effects of disinformation campaigns, and adversarial media movements.

Joan Donovan

Media Manipulation/Platform Accountability Research Lead, Data & Society

(Video of Donovan’s presentation at ISOJ2018 is below bio, along with article from ISOJ team)

Twitter: @BostonJoan
After completing her PhD in Sociology and Science Studies at the University of California San Diego, Joan Donovan was a postdoctoral fellow at the UCLA Institute for Society and Genetics, where she researched white supremacists’ use of DNA ancestry tests, social movements, and technology. For several years, Joan has conducted action research with different networked social movements in order to map and improve the communication infrastructures built by protesters. In her role as a participant, she identifies information bottlenecks, decodes algorithmic behavior, and connects organizations with other like-minded networks. At Data and Society, she is the project lead on media manipulation.

Donovan was  a presenter on the panel TRUST: Tools to Improve the Flow of Accurate Information at ISOJ 2018 on Friday, April 13 @ 1:45 p.m.

Read the story covering Donovan’s panel here.