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Enid Gabriella Coleman (usually known as Gabriella Coleman or Biella; born 1973) is an
anthropologist An anthropologist is a person engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropology is the study of aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms and v ...
, academic and author whose work focuses on cultures of hacking and
online activism Internet activism is the use of electronic communication technologies such as social media, e-mail, and podcasts for various forms of activism to enable faster and more effective communication by citizen movements, the delivery of particular infor ...
, particularly
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anony ...
. She previously held the Wolfe Chair in Scientific & Technological Literacy at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada and is currently a full professor at Harvard University's Department of Anthropology.


Education

After completing her high school education at St. John's School in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Coleman graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in religious studies from Columbia University in May 1996. She moved to the University of Chicago where she completed a Master of Arts in
socio-cultural anthropology Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans. It is in contrast to social anthropology, which perceives cultural variation as a subset of a posited anthropological constant. The portman ...
in August 1999. She was awarded her PhD in socio-cultural anthropology for her dissertation ''The Social Construction of Freedom in Free and Open Source Software: Hackers, Ethics, and the Liberal Tradition'' in 2005.


Academic career

Coleman held positions including a postdoctoral fellowship at the Center for Cultural Analysis,
Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...
and the Izaak Walton Killam Memorial Postdoctoral Fellowship, Program in Science, Technology & Society,
University of Alberta The University of Alberta, also known as U of A or UAlberta, is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It was founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford,"A Gentleman of Strathcona – Alexander Cameron Rutherf ...
before being appointed assistant professor of media, culture and communication at New York University in September 2007. During 2010–2011, Coleman spent some time working at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton as the recipient of the "2010–11 Ginny and Robert Loughlin Founders' Circle Member in the School of Social Science". In January 2012, she moved to Montreal, Quebec, Canada to take up the Wolfe Chair in Scientific & Technological Literacy at McGill University. The same year, she also spoke at
Webstock Webstock is a web technology conference held in Wellington, New Zealand featuring a range of high-profile speakers covering a variety of web-related topics such as accessibility, usability, ethnographic design and development practices. Webstoc ...
2012 in
Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
, New Zealand.


Study of Anonymous

Coleman's work on
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anony ...
has led to her becoming a regular media commentator in addition to her academic publications. In July 2010, Coleman made reference to the Anonymous "project" or "operation"
Chanology Project Chanology (also called Operation Chanology) was a protest movement against the practices of the Church of Scientology by members of Anonymous, a leaderless Internet-based group. "Chanology" is a combination of "4chan" and "Scientology". ...
against the
Church of Scientology The Church of Scientology is a group of interconnected corporate entities and other organizations devoted to the practice, administration and dissemination of Scientology, which is variously defined as a cult, a business, or a new religious ...
and uses what would become a central motif in her descriptions of the group, the " trickster archetype", which she argues is "often not being a very clean and savory character, but perhaps vital for social renewal". Coleman states that she had "been thinking about the linkages between the trickster and hackers" for "a few years" before a stay in hospital led her to read ''Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth, and Art'' by Lewis Hyde: Coleman's theory concerning Anonymous (and associated groups such as
4chan 4chan is an anonymous English-language imageboard website. Launched by Christopher "moot" Poole in October 2003, the site hosts boards dedicated to a wide variety of topics, from anime and manga to video games, cooking, weapons, television, ...
) as the trickster has moved from academia to the mainstream media. Recent references include the three-part series on Anonymous in ''Wired'' magazine and the '' New York Times''. Coleman has also been critical of some of the mainstream coverage of Anonymous. In ''Is it a Crime? The Transgressive Politics of Hacking in Anonymous'' (with Michael Ralph), Coleman responds to an article on the group by Joseph Menn in the '' Financial Times'' noting: ''Our Weirdness Is Free: The logic of Anonymous — online army, agent of chaos, and seeker of justice'', Triple Canopy 2012 January, is Coleman's first major piece of length on the group and draws from a range of observations of those she describes as "everything and nothing at once". Even Coleman admits she does not fully understand Anonymous, she told the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
: Coleman's multi-year ethnographic research on Anonymous culminated in the publication of Hacker Hoaxer Whistleblower Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous. Awarded the American Anthropological Association's Diane Forsythe prize and described by
Alan Moore Alan Moore (born 18 November 1953) is an English author known primarily for his work in comic books including ''Watchmen'', ''V for Vendetta'', ''The Ballad of Halo Jones'', ''Swamp Thing'', ''Batman:'' ''The Killing Joke'', and ''From Hell' ...
, the co-author of V for Vendetta as "brilliantly lucid", the book charts the history, rise, and impact of the Anonymous movement. Even though the book deploys journalistic writing conventions, Coleman continues to analytically frame the activity of trolling and Anonymous in terms of tricksterism. She argues in her book that tricksters "are well positioned to impart lessons—regardless of their intent.". And continues to note: 
“Their actions need not be accepted, much less endorsed, to extract positive value. We may see them as edifying us with liberating or terrifying perspectives, symptomatic of underlying problems that deserve scrutiny, functioning as a positive force toward renewal, or as distorting and confusing shadows.”
The white nationalist troll weev, also treated as a foil to
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anony ...
, is presented as an example of the terrifying side of trickstermism, while
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anony ...
, argues Coleman, represents a more positive side, a force for political hope and renewal. The issues of tricksters, trolls and Anonymous was further explored by a group of anthropologists in special issue of the Journal Hau that reviewed Coleman's book.


Publications

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References


External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Coleman, Gabriella Puerto Rican academics McGill University faculty Living people American anthropologists American women anthropologists Columbia College (New York) alumni University of Chicago alumni American expatriate academics American expatriates in Canada 1973 births American women academics