Vassia barmpa
Producing Race on the Feed: Short-Form News Video, Algorithmic Systems and Creative Labour
Supervisors: Professor Professor Anamik Saha and Professor David Hesmondhalgh School of Media and Communication, University of Leeds
Project Summary
This research project will examine how short-form video content (‘Reels’/’Shorts’) featuring news or news-related material shapes people’s understanding of race, migration and belonging. Audiences largely encounter news incidentally on platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, where algorithmic systems determine which stories get seen and by whom. This raises urgent questions about how highly personalised feeds and fragmented news experiences can weaken shared public understanding and social cohesion. The project also asks how the medium’s demands for brevity, visual immediacy and emotional engagement shape the framing, context and accuracy of news.
Through interviews with news workers and newsroom observation, the research will examine how journalists, editors, producers and social media teams create and distribute these videos under commercial and technological pressures, including AI-assisted editing. Drawing on the researcher’s professional experience, this study will explore the everyday creative labour behind mobile-first news production and how it can produce and reinforce racial hierarchies.
The study will also consider how AI-generated video content affects public trust and how news organisations respond to new challenges around mis- and disinformation, with the aim of supporting more responsible, trustworthy and inclusive forms of factual screen content.
Bio
Vassia is a journalist and researcher whose work explores migration, racial hierarchies and social justice, with more than a decade of experience across Greek and UK newsrooms, including national titles such as the Daily Mirror. She studied Journalism, Media and Communication at undergraduate level and holds a Master of Arts in Race, Media and Social Justice from Goldsmiths, University of London (Distinction).
Drawing on her professional experience, her research examines how news labour and digital technologies intersect in the (re)production of race in the news, with a view to more equitable media practices. Beyond academia, she contributes to public-interest communications on climate justice, supporting press outreach and visibility for activist and community-led movements.