Session: Race, Digital Contexts, and Collaborative Research (Society for Social Work and Research 29th Annual Conference)

In recent years, communication technologies (e.g., social media) have proliferated social work research, education, and practice. In line with this trend, the profession has shown little hesitancy in emboldening social workers to "harness" these technologies to further its mission of bolstering social good. In their proposed Grand Challenges for Social Work, the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare asserts that technology offers social work professionals the opportunity to serve vulnerable and marginalized communities in new and more efficient ways. Despite the promise of communication technologies in this regard, Ruha Benjamin (2019) warns us that "tech fixes often hide, speed up, and even deepen discrimination, while appearing to be neutral or benevolent when compared to racism of a previous era" (p. 8).

Rarely neutral, communication technologies are better likened to an open terrain. We not only do not understand the capabilities or potential of this landscape, but we have limited critical research that informs how we might best use it for social good. Communication technologies are not neutral objects nor tools that can simply be used for the profession's purposes. They often create highly complex social environments that have the potential to sustain, perpetuate, protect against, and disrupt racism and racial hierarchies. In order to truly harness communication technologies, like social media, to further the profession's core mission, there is a stark demand for research that examines if these technologies are actually good for those most marginalized in our society.

This symposium will grapple with the complex reality of social environments created by communication technologies and explore various digital racial formations, including how race is engaged online. Specifically, this symposium will present research on how communication technologies create complex social environments that have the capability to be harmful and interruptive, as well as, the potential to be protective and communal.

The first paper will analyze race in digital spaces related to epistemic justice and abolition; while the second paper will investigate the effects of online microaggressions on health and wellness using a novel measurement scale. The third paper will offer an empirical examination of digital practices of normative whiteness; while the final paper will explore how Black women leverage communication technologies, like social media, to reimagine health, wellness, and culturally congruent care. Collectively, this research will provide key insights regarding the complex reality of communication technologies as potentially harmful, interruptive, communal, or protective. Only by grappling with the nuanced nature of how race and racism manifest in social environments created by communication technologies, can the professional truly begin to harness these technologies for social good.