Rena Bivens
Associate Professor of Communication
| Degrees: | BA (University of Western Ontario), PhD (University of Glasgow) |
| Phone: | 613-520-2600 x 2041 |
| Email: | Rena.Bivens@carleton.ca |
| Office: | Richcraft Hall 4110A |
| Website: |
Biography
Rena Bivens is Associate Professor of Communication. Trained as a sociologist at The University of Western Ontario, Rena moved to Scotland to pursue her PhD with the Glasgow Media Group at the University of Glasgow in the Department of Sociology. Before returning to Canada she spent two years as a Lecturer in Digital Media and Mass Communication at The University of Nottingham鈥檚 campus in Ningbo, China 鈥� the first foreign university (UK) in China with an independent campus. After six years abroad, Rena moved to Ottawa and accepted a SSHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Pauline Jewett Institute of Women鈥檚 and Gender Studies at 杏吧原创 University. She was also affiliated with the Simone de Beauvoir Institute at Concordia University as a Research Associate. Rena then went on to become a Banting Fellow in the School of Journalism and Communication at 杏吧原创. The Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships program is funded by Canada鈥檚 three major funding agencies (SSHRC, NSERC, and CIHR) and is part of an elite suite of federal programs.
Research Interests
Rena鈥檚 research interrogates normative design practices that become embedded within media technologies, including social media software, mobile phone apps, and technologies associated with television news production. Examining the emergence of gender, race, and violence is central to her work. She investigates design and use alongside technical components such as code, software processes, applications, databases, and servers. Science and technology studies, software studies, feminist and queer theory, speculative design, science fiction, new materialism, and philosophy of science inform this work.
Current projects include: programming practices related to gender; social media moderation practices related to misogyny, transphobia and racism; mobile phone apps designed to prevent sexual violence; and the role of social media in the work of ending gender-based violence by non-profit organizations.
Rena is the author of听听(University of Toronto Press, 2014).听Digital Currents听brings television news to the forefront of heated debates over the future of journalism. A careful dissection of the production process unravels the relationships between digital media, the public, journalists, and news organizations. Rena鈥檚 work has also appeared in peer-reviewed journals such as the听International Journal of Communication,听Feminist Media Studies, and听Journalism Practice.
See Rena鈥檚 personal website for more information:听.
Publications
Books
Bivens, R. (2014)听, Toronto: University of Toronto Press. (ISBN: 9781442615861)
Journal Articles
Bivens, R. and Khan, U. (2019)听. Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, No. 15. doi:听10.5399/uo/ada.2019.15.4
Bivens, R. and Hoque, A. S. (2018)听. Canadian Journal of Communication, 43(3): 441-459.
Bivens, R. (2018)听. Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, No. 13. doi:听10.5399/uo/ada.2018.13.5
Bivens, R. (2018)听. No More Potlucks, 49.
Bivens, R. and Hasinoff, A. A. (2017) 鈥溾�澨�Information, Communication & Society.听Advance online publication. doi: 10.1080/1369118X.2017.1309444
Bivens, R. and Haimson, O. L. (2016) 鈥溾�澨�Social Media + Society. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1177/2056305116672486
Bivens, R. (2015) 鈥溾�澨�New Media & Society. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1177/1461444815621527
Bivens, R. (2015) 鈥溾�澨�Feminist Media Studies. doi: 10.1080/14680777.2015.1053717
Bivens, R. (2015) 鈥溾�澨�International Journal of Communication听9: 191-209.
Bivens, R. (2008) 鈥溾�澨�Journalism Practice听2(1): 113-129.听doi: 10.1080/17512780701768568
*reprinted in: Benyahia, S. C., Gardner A., Rayner, P. and Wall, P. (2014)听Media Studies: The Essential Resource, 2nd edition, New York: Routledge.
Book Chapters
Bivens, R. (2019) Programming the Rules of Engagement: Social Media Design and the Nonprofit System, in M. X. Delli Carpini (ed.)听, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Bivens, R. and Fairbairn, J. (2015) 鈥淨uit Facebook, Don鈥檛 Sext and Other Futile Attempts to Protect Youth鈥� in S. Tarrant (ed.)听, New York: Routledge.
Bivens, R. and Li, C. (2009) 鈥淲eb-Oriented Public Participation in Contemporary China鈥� in G. Monaghan and S. Tunney (eds.)听, Brighton: Sussex Academic Press.
Refereed Conference Proceedings
Handel, M. J., Bivens, R., Brubaker, J. R., Haimson, O. L., Lingel, J., & Yarosh, S. (2015) 鈥溾��, in听Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference Companion on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing听(pp. 122鈥�125). New York, NY, USA: ACM.听doi:10.1145/2685553.2699337
Encyclopedia Articles
Bivens, R. (2014) 鈥淢orozov Principle鈥� in K. Harvey (ed.)听, Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
Bivens, R. (2014) 鈥淪hirky Principle鈥� in K. Harvey (ed.)听, Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.听
Reports
Obar, J. A., Taylor, G., Antoine, D., Bivens, R., Caidi, N., Johnson, A., Middleton, C., and Skinner, D. (2014) 鈥溾��, New York: Open Society Foundations.
Fairbairn, J., Bivens, R., and Dawson, M. (2013) 鈥溾��, Ottawa: Crime Prevention Ottawa/Ottawa Coalition to End Violence Against Women.
Blog Posts
Bivens, R. (2016) 鈥溾��, Cyborgology, 27 January.
*, 27 January 2016.
Bivens, R. (2015) 鈥溾��,听Culture Digitally, June 9.