Australian Activists as Storytellers in Digital Spaces: Acquiring Skills, Producing Content and Getting the Message Out

ABSTRACT As modes of activism rapidly evolve, activists—both seasoned and emerging—must increasingly navigate a hybrid terrain of both digital and non‐digital engagement. This paper draws on the personal narratives of 16 nascent activists based in Australia to explore how they develop competencies related to digital storytelling, which is critical to their activism in online spaces. Making a contribution to knowledge, our analysis captures how activists' identities emerge through the co‐constitutive interplay of platform affordances, skills acquisition and the wider activist ecosystem. To document this co‐constitution, we draw on a variety of theoretical frameworks—specifically transmedia storytelling, digital text production and digital activism. In exploring their activist efforts and identity formation, we draw on three key themes: (1) personal narrative as political storytelling; (2) investing in key skills for digital storytelling; (3) storytelling and authenticity. The paper concludes by questioning the role of the digital in activism efforts today and how, for many activists we spoke with, this leads to ethical deliberations as they strive to be authentic in order to enact social change within a digital activist social media landscape which can often be interpreted as superficial.