Matthew N. Hannah

My current research and teaching focus particularly on extremist beliefs and conspiracy movements online. I focus on the history of conspiracy theories in an effort to understand the contemporary obsession with alternative political explanations for current events. Much of my research focuses on the conspiracy movement known as QAnon, which began in 2017 on the imageboard 4chan and which continues to play a significant role in American cultural and political life. I seek to trace the modes of rhetorical and epistemological dynamics at work in conspiracy movements such as QAnon in an effort to develop resources to help deradicalize conspiracy theorists and promote healthier information seeking behavior, and I hope to collaborate with the brilliant students at UW-Madison to develop such toolkits.

Future research projects will focus on climate change conspiracy theories, and I have become interested in Science and Technology Studies as a new cluster of research. More broadly, I am interested in the impact of platform capitalism on beliefs as well as the interdisciplinary cluster of methods within the fields of Digital Humanities and digital scholarship. As the inaugural Director of the Digital Scholarship Hub in Memorial Library, I seek interdisciplinary opportunities to explore and advance computational research at UW-Madison, building connections between the humanities and social sciences and STEM disciplines. I have extensive experience in Digital Humanities and have built DH programs at several universities, and I look forward to building bridges between the Digital Studies program and the Digital Scholarship Hub.