Research
Digital Cultures and Mediated Social Interactions
What does it mean to be human in mediated communication environments?
How do we want to be together?
My research focuses on the cultural/social implications of boundary-crossing practices in human-technology assemblages. What does it mean to communicate together across diverse "real", "online", "virtual", or "imaginary" places? How should we approach the mundane and the weird, and the "normal" and the "Other"? I specialize in qualitative research, but also conduct and enjoy quantitative, mix-methodological, and interdisciplinary collaborative research.
I was featured in the 2024 UIC Communication Faculty Highlight. Click to read more about my research and teaching.
For PDF of my work or a list of work in progress, please contact me at doownkim[at]uic[dot]edu.
Current Project: Virtual Influencers
VI_moving.movBook manuscript in development:
Virtually Real: Humanlike Virtual Influencers
and Politics of Artificial Technologies
(click title for more)
Research Areas
Being together: Real "vs" Virtual?
"Pay for your choices": Deconstructing neoliberal choice through free-to-play mobile interactive fiction games. New Media & Society, 25(5).
I'll Play on My Other Account: The Network and Behavioral Differences of Sybils. Proceedings of the ACM on Human Computer Interaction [CHI Play]. (Second author, co-authored with Fred Morstatter, Natalie Jonckheere, Calvin Liu, Malika Seth, and Dmitri Williams)
Third places in the Ether Around Us: Layers on the Real World. In J. Pascoe, & C. Bosman (Eds.), Rethinking Third Places: Informal Public Spaces and Community Building. Edward Elgar Publishing. (Second author, co-authored with Dmitri Williams)
Artificial Not Welcome, Real Is Better? Sus Virtual Beings Among Us. In Media Res, Media Commons.
Everyday, Playful Participation
Flying Cars and Bigots: Projecting Post-COVID-19 Worlds Through the Atlas of the Civic Imagination as Refuge for Hope. Continuum: Journal of Media & Communication Studies. (Equal contribution, co-authored with select members from the research group Civic Paths [PIs: Henry Jenkins, Sangita Shresthova])
Connecting In-Game Performance, Need Satisfaction, and Psychological Well-Being for Video Game Players across the Lifespan. New Media & Society. (Third author, co-authored with Mingxuan Liu, Sukyoung Choi, and Dmitri Williams)
The Joy Kill Club: On Squid Game (2021), a Roundtable-Monologue by a Korean Female Aca-fan (Part One). ibid. (Part Two). Confessions of an Aca-fan. Henryjenkins.org.
Mirroring the Misogynistic Wor(l)d: Civic Imagination and Speech Mirroring Strategy in Korea’s Online Feminist Activism. In H. Jenkins, G. Peters-Lazaro, & S. Shresthova (Eds.), Popular Culture and the Civic Imagination: Case Studies of Creative Social Change [Awarded 2021 Browne Best Edited Collection in Popular Culture and American Culture]. NYU Press.
Place, Technology, and the Othered
Digital Feminism and Affective Splintering: South Korean Twitter Discourse on 500 Yemeni Refugees. International Journal of Communication, 14, 19. (First author, co-authored with Nathaniel Ming Curran, Hyun Tae (Calvin) Kim)
“Everyone deserves a Smartphone?”: Understanding the media’s legitimation of mobile technology use by Syrian refugees. Mass Communication and Society, 22(6), 779-803. (Equal contribution, co-authored with Andrea Alarcon, Jeeyun Baik)
GPS Tracking in Dementia Caregiving: Social Norm, Perceived Usefulness, and Behavioral Intent to Use Technology. Proceedings of the 54th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 3804-3817. (co-authored with Yao Sun, Hye Min Kim, Yusi Xu, Yunwen Wang, Jillian Kwong, Steffie Kim, Margaret McLaughlin)
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ResearchGate: Do Own Donna Kim
Google Scholar: Do Own (Donna) Kim
Email: doownkim[at]uic[dot]edu