A visual analysis of the
MeToo Movement

MeToomentum

Can social media become a vehicle to foster social change? MeToomentum addresses this question by dissecting the popular Twitter social Movement #MeToo. Sexual abuse and workplace harassment are all too common, this online dialogue has shed light on the magnitude of the problem.

Focusing on the movement’s first six months on Twitter, this visual analysis dissects about 200,000 tweets. We borrowed the dandelion metaphor to illustrate our findings. Although considered a pest, for its ability to spread and grow anywhere, the common dandelion is a beautiful flower which has been used in popular culture to symbolise: endurance, growth, and the possibility of change.

Each of the three visualisations addresses a different question:

Where did the #MeToo Movement spread?

Spreading

Spreading visualization

This dandelion shows the geographical footprint of the MeToo Movement.

Although it started in North America, the #MeToo Movement spread quickly around the globe. This phenomenon has enabled survivors and advocates to overcome geographical distances – and it provides hope that underrepresented voices can help bring about institutional and cultural change.

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What themes is the #MeToo Movement rooted in?

Rooting

Rooting visualization

This dandelion visualises the most frequent words and themes.

Finding its roots in historical, systemic gender imbalance, this Twitter ‘tsunami’ has been fueled by an outpouring of personal perspective, the stories shared ranged from tragedy and accusation, to solidarity and calls to action.

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The anatomy of a hashtag

Read about the ambition and process behind this dataviz project in an article written by one of the authors Valentina D'Efilippo:

About us

Authors photographed

Valentina D'Efilippo

Designer with a focus on information design and data visualisation. Her work takes many forms – from theatre productions and exhibitions, to books, editorial content and interactive platforms.

@defilippovale
hello@valentinadefilippo.co.uk

Lucia Kocincova

Front end engineer specialising in creative coding and data visualisation. She especially loves to create interactive tools to explore the hidden insights in various datasets.

@_lucyia
ping@lucyia.com

About the data

According to the Washington Post, more than 96 million tweets from 2010-2017 had something to do with the sexual harassment conversation. We collected around 200,000 tweets from the beginning of October to the end of March containing and/or related to #MeToo.

In the interactive visualisation “Trending Seeds” we mapped out the most popular tweets by selecting the ones with more than 1,000 retweets – about 1,500 tweets in total.

Based on the scale of the online conversation, this in not a comprehensive analysis; but rather an attempt to illustrate the power of social media as a catalyst for social change and the scale of the movement.

Data Obscura exhibition Data Obscura exhibition
Data Obscura exhibition Data Obscura exhibition

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