Abstract
The hashtag has a very short history but according to Andreas Bernard, it is ‘the most prominent sign of our times’, which has ‘contributed so much in recent years to the formation of the public sphere’ (blurb). The hashtag first appeared in a tweet on 23 August 2007. In his short book, Bernard traces its history and discusses its significance. He argues that the hashtag is ‘no longer a purely functional sign – for some time, in fact, it has also been a promising social symbol’ because it ‘stands for the production and accumulation of public attention’ (p. 4). He acknowledges that the two areas in which the hashtag has played a most prominent role are political activism and marketing. Bernard focuses on one powerful example of the influence of the hashtag on socio-political movements: the #MeToo movement against sexual violence. The book is split into seven chapters. Chapter 1, ‘A Sign of the Times’, explains what the significance of the hashtag is and why it is worth studying it. Chapter 2, ‘Hashtags and the Dispersion of Statements’ and Chapter 3, ‘The Biography of a Symbol’ trace the history of the hashtag. Chapter 4, ‘Where Was the Keyword Before the Hashtag’, explores ‘what roles the processes of indexing or “keywording” had played before the revolutionary rise of digital culture’ (p. 28). The following two chapters then look into the two main ‘venues of the hashtag’ (p. 48) – political activism and marketing. The final chapter explores what the author labels as the ‘dilemma of the hashtag – the fact that it empowers people yet also places everything on the same level’ (p. 77). This short book poses a lot of food for thought and it will be of interest to both scholars and students in communication studies.