CIS 720 Seminar – A Talk on Understanding Short-form Videos through Theatrical-Level Affordances

Abstract: Short-form video is the major approach for people to present themselves on visual social media, such as TikTok. This platform has gained fame over the years in countries such as America, while also receiving criticism. What is behind this type of visual communication? With the emerging field of social media and performance, can theatrical or performative discourse help to understand this TikTok platform?

The research question aims to find how theatrical discourse helps to explain short-form videos on TikTok, by using the walkthrough method and multimodal analysis. Building on three theories in which the ontology of theater is often discussed, the paper analyzes the modes of videos through media-level and high-level conceptualizations of affordances. The preliminary findings suggest a framework S&S-M-A for short-form video analysis, to look into the affordance of theatricality in videos with similar approaches.

Bio: Yi-Ting Wang is a CIS PhD student. Her research combines social media with theater and performance studies. She wants to understand people’s presentations in everyday life via visual social media, through a theatrical and performative perspective. Currently, she is working on the sense making of the short-form videos on platforms such as TikTok.