Collecting Pennsylvania Political Twitter Data

Authors

  • Andrew M. Dudash Penn State University Libraries
  • John E. Russell Penn State University Libraries

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/palrap.2021.249

Abstract

During the two most recent elections we have seen the importance of social media, and Twitter in particular, for political discourse. This paper describes the effort of an academic library to collect election-related Twitter data from Pennsylvania-specific organizational accounts and hashtags for 2018 and 2020 in the run-up and aftermath of both election cycles. Because of its importance to understanding contemporary politics and its historic value, libraries need to consider the opportunity to collect and make this data accessible to Pennsylvanians.  

Author Biographies

Andrew M. Dudash, Penn State University Libraries

Librarian for Political Science, Policy Studies, and Government Information

John E. Russell, Penn State University Libraries

Digital Humanities Librarian

References

DeJesus, I. (2018, November 19). Midterm voter turnout in Pa. keeps up with historic national levels. www.pennlive.com/news/2018/11/midterm-voter-turnout-in-pa-keeps-up-with-historic-national-levels.html

Documenting the Now. (2020). Hydrator. GitHub. github.com/docnow/hydrator

George Washington University Libraries. (2016). Social Feed Manager. Zenodo. doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.597278

Pinter, A. T., Goldman, B., & Novotny, E. (2017). Pennsylvania perspectives of the 2016 election: A project to collect web and social media content around significant societal events. Pennsylvania Libraries: Research & Practice, 5(2), 96-106. doi.org/10.5195/PALRAP.2017.146

Shaffer, Kris. (2018). tweetmineR. GitHub. github.com/kshaffer/tweetmineR

Shortell, T. (2020, November 17). Biden vs. Trump showdown drove Pennsylvania voter turnout to historic high. The Morning Call. www.mcall.com/news/elections/mc-nws-pa-2020-election-set-modern-record-20201117-dook5smfy5emjnzzkvhltoh4vq-story.html

Twitter. (2021). “More About Restricted Uses of the Twitter APIs.” Twitter Developer Terms. developer.twitter.com/en/developer-terms/more-on-restricted-use-cases

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Published

2021-06-29

Issue

Vol. 9 No. 1 (2021)

Section

Feature

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