Algorithmic imaginings and critical digital literacy on #BookTok

Abstract

Despite the growing impact of algorithms on digital culture, and the importance of algorithmic awareness, little literacy research has investigated how algorithmic awareness and speculation shapes cultural production on digital platforms. Developing Bucher’s concept of the “algorithmic imagination” for digital literacy research, we conduct a study of #BookTok, the home of book-related content on TikTok, the most algorithm-driven social media platform to date. Through a multimodal content analysis of 57 videos containing #algorithm and #BookTok, we propose and explore a typology of five categories of “algorithmic imaginings”: critique, defense, explanation, how to work, and exploration of the algorithm. These imaginaries move beyond rational attempts to deconstruct the algorithm and critique its role in platform capitalism toward playful explorations of the human–algorithmic relationship. This constitutes for us another dimension of critical literacy, as producers anthropomorphize technology in a manner that addresses the symbiotic meaning-making of human and machine head-on.