Mini Twitter Investigation

For this investigation we expect to see a frequent use of declaratives used to represent power and used data from Twitter as evidence to support our hypothesis. We used Fairtrade Foundation’s Twitter feed and chose every other tweet to study so the investigation was fair and reliable. Fairtrade is in a position of power therefore it was ideal to use their tweets; Ed Miliband’s Twitter feed was also one ideal for this use due to his position of power. We used the same method of choosing every other tweet as a form of systematic sampling. To obtain more of a diverse, random sample, we used the first page of a personal Timeline showing tweets from people followed. We also used the method of selecting every other tweet for our analysis.

After collecting the data from the Fairtrade feed, we studied four tweets. Two contained declarative statements, for example, “This special blend is darkly roasted to produce a rich and caramelly sweetness.” By contrast, the other two only contained interrogative statements, for instance, “Who pays the price for our clothing?” This feed both contradicted and agreed with our hypothesis equally.  Ed Miliband’s feed differed from Fairtrade as it contained no interrogatives or imperatives. Out of four tweets we looked at through the selection process, such as, “I am grateful to the people who worked on our campaign,” all of them were declarative statements which support our hypothesis.

After selecting three tweets from the Twitter feed, the majority were also declarative such as, “The suffragettes didn’t fight to be left out of an entire GCSE history paper.” However, one tweet had an imperative mood, “Don’t ever stop being you.” It was interesting and valuable to use a random Twitter feed because of the contrast between average individuals and celebrities who have a higher position of power. Two individuals out of the three were celebrities, one used a declarative and the other imperative which again, both disagrees and agrees with my hypothesis.

Declaratives work alongside hashtags and tagging other users which are usually large and powerful organisations. For example, Fairtrade tag their other Fairtrade accounts such as @FairtradeUKNews to make them appear more powerful and a larger organisation. They also tag users not linked to their companies, such as @StarbucksUK to make their power base and connections seem more wide scale.  They also use declarative hashtags to promote their tweets, such as #Fairtrade. By using hashtags and tagging other users, for example, @MichaelJackson in our random tweets feed, they are allowing more people to view their tweets. They display their power by making their tweets viral and shared.

In all of the Twitter feeds we have used as evidence, all use declaratives in the form of sentences and using the tagging feature on Twitter. However, some power was expressed in the form of interrogative rhetorical questions or imperatives. But overall the dominant sentence type appears to be declaratives. To better my investigation for the future, I will include a larger range of examples of Twitter feeds to support or disprove my hypothesis.