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A hockey riot occurred on June 15, 2011 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Riots involve crowds. The presence of social media changes the spatial and temporal elements of the crowd, a process that contributes to online collective interpretations of social events, including riots. A key element of this process concerns the definition of the situation. Using Qualitative Media Analysis, we illustrate how the researcher of everyday life can retrieve and examine an accumulation of “definitions of situations” from social media, a process that provides insight into collective interpretations, including how online users made sense of the Vancouver riot. We begin with a short overview of the riot, briefly profile collective behavior in relation to the definition of the situation, and contextualize the importance of media in this process. We then examine what select posts made on social media can tell us about collective meaning making in relation to the Vancouver riot. We conclude by suggesting some directions for future research.

This chapter analyses the presence of Russian feminists and female LGBTIQ+ activists within US-American mainstream media. In the course of a multimedia discourse analysis, it briefly raises questions of who becomes featured and how, to argue that current debates marginalise Russian queer female, trans*gender and intersex voices, compared to those of male queers. One exception to this trend is the case of the journalist and activist Masha Gessen. Together with Nadya Tolokonnikova of the protest group Pussy Riot, Gessen seems to represent Russian queers and feminists within US media. Although marginal, compared to the presence of US feminisms, especially popular culture figures such as Beyoncé Knowles-Carter or Lady Gaga, the two women become frequently featured within US news media and beyond. Frequently, those articles, interviews and discussions of their work open up a debate, or rather comparisons, between US values and Russian values, questions of modernity, progress and civilisation. Equally often, the female Russian dissidents are pictured as ‘Putin’s victims’ – the female versions of David fighting against Goliath – by focussing especially on their physical vulnerability and their female bodies. In this vein, feminism is constructed as inherently ‘Western’, while the bodies that carry out such feminisms and most of all their country of origin is entirely ‘othered’. Comparing the (self-)representations to other voices of female Russian dissent within US media, the author critically discuss the Western gaze of US mainstream media, its victimising strategies and homonationalistic construction of US identity and US nation in rejection of a ‘backward’ homophobic Russia.

This chapter integrates both structural and symbolic interactionist perspectives used in the study of collective behavior to provide a thorough examination of the campus culture and student–police interactions that precipitated a riot near James Madison University (JMU). While the analysis is anchored by Smelser’s (1971 [1962]) “value-added” model, it also accounts for cultural conditions common on college campuses. Importantly, the dynamics associated with this case may be similar to other riots – at sporting events, at religious processionals, etc. – occurring when authorities disrupt gatherings that have strong cultural resonance among participants. In these cases, attempts at disruption may be seen as an assault on norms strongly associated with a group’s identity. The study also used a unique data source – 39 YouTube videos posted of the riot event – that made it possible to capture the interactive and emergent quality of rioting behavior in real time from multiple vantage points.

We conducted a narrative analysis of a collective narrative comprising inscriptions left on the locally famed “Apology Wall,” written by thousands of community members in the immediate aftermath of the 2011 Vancouver Stanley Cup Riot. In considering the Apology Wall as an “evocative object,” this study emphasized the significance of material objects as meaning-making devices. Interpretation of themes was conducted through a constructivist lens, specifically guided by literature concerning meaning-making following negative life events. Results bolstered the significance of the Wall as a sense-making device that provided a forum for the community to collectively share positive emotional expression, construct solidarity and collective identity, and express desires for restoration. By studying this collective narrative, the study not only illuminated how those affected constructed meaning after the Vancouver sports riot, but it also contributes to the literature on how communities, in general, make early sense of and respond to destructive events.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the Riot Grrrl activist network in the USA and highlight historical anarchist actions of the Washington, DC chapter by examining the nexus of feminism and anarchism on a continuum of youth activism, and by paying attention to anti-war campaigns, food distribution programs, free clinics and girl culture.

The paper historically contextualizes Riot Grrrl within the Situationist International literature and cultural resistance as well as Donna Harraway’s work on cultural workers. Ethnographic work incorporates participant observation and semi-structured interviews as well as textual analysis of rare Riot Grrrl artifacts. Focus is given to the production of zines as mechanisms for communicating and deconstructing anarcho-grrrl culture.

This paper charts the influence of Riot Grrrl with particular attention to anti-war demonstrations to contemporary activist projects that illustrate tenants of anarchism such as non-hierarchical leadership, direction action, cooperation, mutual aid and volunteerism.

This paper focuses on the Riot Grrrl network in the USA, with a focus on the Washington, DC chapter. Subsequent Riot Grrrl chapters emerged around the world and future research might attend to regional impact these groups made in their communities.

The originality of the paper resides not only in its ethnographic approach to the essence of being a Riot Grrrl, but also includes the author’s own reflections of involvement in this girl-centered activist collective. Further, the author acknowledges Los Angeles performance artist Exene Cervanka, whose anti-war writing and activist work was influential to the Riot Grrrl movement. This essay examines actions to (re)organize, and to disrupt preferred meanings and interpretations of organization and protest so as to mobilize knowledge and to affect authentic social change. This paper commemorates the 25th anniversary of Riot Grrrl and the Mount Pleasant Riots.

This paper aims to quantify characteristics of areas that experienced rioting across the UK in August 2011. Through exploring the areas where riots occurred, and those that did not have any problems, variables and factors that may have contributed to a geographical area experiencing rioting can begin to be identified. Through doing so, it is hoped that local authorities can be better prepared to deal with potential similar situations in the future.

National indicator data were collated for all local authority areas across England. After a literature review, and preliminary analysis, a set of indicators that the authors thought could be potential factors were identified. Using these indicators as input variables logistic regression was completed, with the target variable defined as whether or not the local authority had experienced any rioting (target variable was binary categorical – Yes/No).

A logistic regression equation was produced that gave a risk score to each local authority area. Using an ROC Curve an optimum cut off point was created. Anything over this cut off point was deemed to be vulnerable to rioting. The overall accuracy of the model was 88.4 per cent. The positive predictive value was 97.2 per cent and the negative predictive value was 42.9 per cent. Predictor variables included in the model were: existing acquisitive crime rates; unemployment deprivation; and education/level 4 attainment.

Due to the short turnaround time of producing this insight, only limited data are available to build a model on. The paper focuses on characteristics of the geographical areas where rioting occurred, rather than the traits of the culprits themselves. Since completing the paper, more information has become available.

With key predictor variables identified, it is possible to look at areas that are a potential risk. The false positives and false negatives (local authority areas that did not behave as the model suggested) also pose interesting questions. Why did rioting not occur in certain areas that showed the same characteristics as those that experienced rioting?

Where a riot risk is noted as high, local public services may consider any actions that could be taken to tackle the risk and can use this information to justify continued resources in that area.

Many discussions were had in the months that followed the August riots. These discussions tended to focus on the perpetrators and not the areas that are analysed in this paper.

The purpose of this paper is to examine crowd violence in relation to the 2011 Stanley Cup Riot from the perspective of those police officers who were involved in the event, and identify any lessons that can be learned from this incident.

A total of 460 Vancouver police officers participated in this study. Police perceptions of the riot were elicited via mailed questionnaires, which focused on key themes related to crowd disorder and police response, including preparations, deployment, training, safety, causes, and future prevention. Questionnaire responses were analyzed using descriptive approaches and one-sample t-tests.

The study findings revealed that, in general, police felt ill-prepared prior to the riot, and ill- and unsafe during the riot. Their responses also suggested that their negative perceptions of the riot were the result of a few prominent factors, namely inadequate deployment, a lack of operational planning, and the presence of a large and belligerent crowd.

This study represents an important first step in understanding the issues associated with preventing and containing disorderly crowds from the perspective of police officers. Although valuable, this study does have a few limitations, including post hoc data collection.

This study provides important insights into the causes of riots and the particular difficulties officers face during the course of a riot. These insights may be used by departments to assist with planning and preparations related to preventing riots and effectively limiting crowd disorder.

This is the first study to examine police perceptions in a Canadian context. It utilizes a comparatively large sample, and is among the very few studies that includes the views of officers who have actually experienced a riot.

This article aims to explore the impact of new social media on the 2011 English riots.

The paper suggests that discourse on the riots in the news and popular press is obscured by speculation and political rhetoric about the role of social media in catalysing the unrest that overlooks the role of individual agency and misrepresents the emotional dimensions of such forms of collective action.

In considering the riots to be symptomatic of criminality and austerity, commentators have tended to revive nineteenth‐ and twentieth‐century crowd theories to make sense of the unrest, which are unable to account for the effect of new social media on this nascent twenty‐first century phenomenon.

Here, the notion of the “mediated crowd” is introduced to argue that combining emotions research with empirical analysis can provide an innovative account of the relationship between new social media and the type of collective action that took place during the riots. Such a concept challenges orthodox nineteenth‐ and twentieth‐century crowd theories that consider crowds to be a corollary of “emotive contagion” in spatial proximity, with “the mediated crowd” mobilised in the twenty‐first century through social networking in both geographic and virtual arenas.

The paper proposes that this original approach provides insight into the particular conditions in which the 2011 English riots emerged, while advancing crowd theory in general.

The “Rotis not Riots” group is an online discussion forum formed during the August 2011 riots in England to facilitate feminist dialogue aimed at making sense of these unprecedented events.

The founders use roti (a type of unleavened bread) as a symbol to focus attention on the importance of sharing different perspectives. This reflective paper draws on the group's exchanges, exploring: the complexity of the ways in which gender intersects with the riots and their aftermath; the role of consumerism and race; the ways in which the media has framed the riots in news stories; and the ways in which criminal justice system responses have been received by both the media and the general public.

The paper concludes by examining some of the group's ideas about how Britain might move forwards through responses that are constructive rather than punitive, aimed at ensuring that all citizens feel they have a stake in both their local community and British society as a whole.

The focus of this paper is on fostering positive collective action and dialogue that involves people of all ages and backgrounds.

This paper is one of the first attempts to explain the local dynamics of the 2010 ethnic riots in Kyrgyzstan. No scholarly work has attempted to systematically analyze the 2010 ethnic violence and its local dynamics on the neighborhood scale. The purpose of this paper is to shed light on this gap by analyzing neighborhoods’ responses to the emerging violence in the city of Osh. In order to do this, the author compares two typical neighborhoods in Osh, one violent and the other non-violent, with different spatial structures and built environments that demonstrate/represent similar dynamics of riots in many other neighborhoods.

The empirical findings of this paper are based on the ethnographic fieldwork the author carried out in 2010 and between 2012 and 2014. During nine months (in total) of the author’s ethnographic fieldwork, the author conducted around 60 semi-structured interviews in Osh city mainly with community leaders. In the author’s interview sampling, the author used two approaches: the snowball method and geographically/territorially representative sampling.

The author argues that among other factors, a particular type of public space provides favorable conditions for riot occurrence or non-occurrence. For example, in Osh, such places as areas around the central bazaar and densely populated multi-story building complexes were especially riot-prone. By contrast, residential areas with individual-unit houses and low residential mobility represented communally private spaces with more easy riot-control. In addition, some residential areas implemented strategies such as physical self-isolation to avoid violence. By restricting freedom of movement and erecting improvised barricades, the residents of such neighborhoods created a temporally new space with its own rules and interethnic cooperation.

This paper suggests new insights in the analysis of riots by connecting theoretical categories and concepts of space provided by scholars of contentious politics and applying them to the case of the 2010 ethnic riots in Osh city. By analyzing riot dynamics on the neighborhood scale, this research contributes to the understanding of the spatial dynamics of ethnic riots.