Stefania Manca

• PhD in Education and ICT
• Research Director at Italian National Research Council

Digital technologies and social media platforms have been used in museum communication for over a decade now, and Holocaust museums have increasingly adopted them in their modes of commemoration and provision of educational content. Nevertheless, very limited research has been conducted into the potential of social media as new memory ecologies. In...

This study takes a social-technical systems approach to investigate how national and transnational memory of the Holocaust are intertwined on the social media profiles of a set of Italian museums and memorials. We examine how Italy’s four most important Holocaust museums and memorials use social media as ecosystems to provide historical content and...

This study adopts a conceptual research approach to examine recent developments in Digital Holocaust Memory regarding the use of digital technology for teaching and learning about the Holocaust. In order to promote heritage education, this paper proposes a conceptual framework that links the field of Digital Holocaust Memory with the approach of le...

While Holocaust museums have embraced social media to connect with online audiences and provide educational materials, the specifics of their use are not well understood. A Delphi study involving 22 experts developed a framework for examining Holocaust-related social media content. This framework, the result of a three-round iterative process, incl...

Over the past few years, digitalisation has led to the development of new forms of Holocaust memory, with advances in digital technology reshaping and introducing alternative ways of remembering, understanding and representing the Holocaust. The purpose of this study is to examine how three Holocaust survivors – Lily Ebert (100), Gidon Lev (88) and...

Összefoglaló. Az antiszemitizmus történelmi korszakokon és földrajzi régiókon átívelően fennmaradt, és különböző formákban nyilvánul meg, az ősi előítéletektől a modern online gyűlöletbeszédig. Napjainkban a zsidó közösségek folyamatos kihívásokkal néznek szembe, beleértve az antiszemita incidensek számának nemrégiben világszerte tapasztalt megugrá...

Sintesi L'antisemitismo ha attraversato molte epoche storiche e regioni geografiche, assumendo forme diverse, dai pregiudizi antichi ai moderni discorsi d'odio online. Oggi le comunità ebraiche continuano a confrontarsi con sfide crescenti, tra cui un recente aumento degli episodi di antisemitismo in tutto il mondo. Dopo gli eventi del 7 ottobre,...

Executive summary Antisemitism has persisted across historical periods and geographical regions, manifesting itself in different forms, from ancient prejudices to modern online hate speech. Today, Jewish communities face ongoing challenges, including a recent spike in antisemitic incidents worldwide. Following the events of 7 October, there has be...

Cultural institutions responsible for preserving and transmitting the history and memory of the Holocaust include museums and memorials. These institutions remind visitors of the tragedy and aim to educate them about the events that led to it, the people affected and the lessons that can be learned from it. They also serve to honour the victims and...

This thesis investigates the lifelong learning ecologies that combine formal, non-formal, and informal learning to foster understanding and participation in the new Holocaust memory landscapes shaped by digital technologies. Stemming from an analysis of the relationships between post-witness historical memory and the emerging media ecosystems that...

La didattica della Shoah rappresenta un argomento importante nei programmi di storia e studi sociali di molti Paesi. Il suo obiettivo principale è sensibilizzare sui temi della persecuzione e della deportazione che hanno portato allo sterminio degli ebrei, promuovendo la comprensione del suo contesto storico e sviluppando il pensiero critico e l’em...

A partire dall'inizio degli anni '90, si è assistito alla nascita e allo sviluppo di una dimensione europea della memoria all'interno della quale il ricordo della Shoah ha giocato un ruolo sempre più fondamentale (Levy & Sznaider, 2006). Ciò che è avvenuto è stato uno spostamento dalle politiche della memoria e dell'identità gestite dagli stati naz...

In this chapter, we investigate how four Italian and five German Holocaust memorials and museums, as well as three major internationally relevant Holocaust organizations, employed Facebook for Holocaust remembrance purposes during the period of pandemic lockdown. A comparison was made of the quantity and variety of activity on their Facebook pages...

Holocaust education, which refers to the teaching and learning of the Holocaust—the systematic genocide of six million Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during World War II—is an essential component of history and social studies education in many countries. Its primary aim is to raise awareness of the Holocaust, promote understanding of it...

By articulating a shared victimhood or guilt or responsibility, memorial museums are designed as ethical projects that encourage visitors to learn from the past to build a “better future”. In contemporary Europe, Holocaust memorials and museums constitute a trajectory of remembrance about public Holocaust memory that consolidates political legitima...

Background Holocaust memory and learning processes have become increasingly mediatised as a result of rapid technological advances. There is, however, little information available regarding how people learn about this topic informally through social media. Objectives This paper explores how adult learners develop their learning ecologies by using...

With the recent COVID-19 pandemic and disruption of campus-based education, the use of mobile social networking applications to supplement formal education has attracted a great deal of attention. Teachers do have opportunities to join students’ online groups to share, clarify, and exchange housekeeping information and course-related content with t...

With the significant growth of social media use for formal and informal learning, research scholarship has also progressively focused on the threats that the manipulation of user behavior via algorithms and the misinformation pushed in disparate ways are causing to democratic participation and online civic engagement. In this chapter, we address th...

The use of social media in higher education has been demonstrated in a number of studies to be an attractive and contemporary method of teaching and learning. However, further research and investigation are required in order to align social media's pedagogical benefits with the theoretical perspectives that inform educational practices. It is the o...

Sono passati ormai più di settant’anni dalla fine della Seconda guerra mondiale e i nomi di Auschwitz, Dachau, Buchenwald e Bergen-Belsen continuano a restare nella memoria collettiva come gli emblemi dei crimini e dell’orrore del nazionalsocialismo. Milioni di persone provenienti dai Paesi in cui i nazisti e i loro alleati avevano preso il potere...

A partire dall'inizio degli anni '90, si è assistito alla nascita e allo sviluppo di una dimensione europea della memoria all'interno della quale il ricordo della Shoah ha giocato un ruolo sempre più fondamentale (Levy & Sznaider, 2006). Ciò che è avvenuto è stato uno spostamento dalle politiche della memoria e dell'identità gestite dagli stati naz...

Purpose Although current research has investigated how open research data (ORD) are published, researchers' behaviour of ORD sharing on academic social networks (ASNs) remains insufficiently explored. The purpose of this study is to investigate the connections between ORDs publication and social activity to uncover data literacy gaps. Design/metho...

The aim of this study was to reveal research trends from 2009 to 2021 by bibliometric analysis and to examine qualitative content of articles related to the use of social media as a teaching and learning tool in higher education. For bibliometric mapping analysis, a total of 772 articles were accessed and for content analysis, a total of 55 article...

FÜR WEN SIND DIESE LEITLINIEN UND EMPFEHLUNGEN GEDACHT? Dieser Bericht soll Holocaust-Museen und -Gedenkstätten eine Reihe von Leitlinien und Empfehlungen an die Hand geben, um dem Phänomen der Holocaust-Verzerrung auf Social-Media- Kanälen zu begegnen. Da diese Einrichtungen zunehmend wichtige Eckpfeiler gegen die Verzerrung des Holocausts darste...

Executive summary The context. Abuse, excuse, misrepresentation and manipulation of the history of the Holocaust are far from a fringe phenomenon. They have an international dimension and considerable weight (e.g., governments that seek to minimize their historical responsibility, conspiracy theorists who accuse Jews of exaggerating their suffering...

Abusi, scuse, travisamenti e manipolazioni della storia della Shoah si possono riscontrare a tutti i livelli della società. Si tratta di un fenomeno tutt'altro che marginale: se ne possono trovare esempi nei governi che cercano di minimizzare la loro responsabilità storica, nei teorici della cospirazione che accusano gli ebrei di esagerare le loro...

Abuse, excuse, misrepresentation and manipulation of the history of the Holocaust can be found at all levels of society. This is far from a fringe phenomenon: examples may be found in governments that seek to minimize their historical responsibility, conspiracy theorists who accuse Jews of exaggerating their suffering for financial gain, and online...

In this report, we present the findings of a Delphi Study aimed at validating a framework which has been designed to analyse Holocaust-related content published on the social media profiles of Holocaust museums. The study may also be considered as a pedagogical tool for teachers to provide orientation for conducting their own analysis or research a...

In this report, we present the findings of a survey which was aimed at investigating if and how a large sample of Holocaust museums and memorials use Social Media (SM) in their communication channels. The findings reported in this study reflect the responses of 69 Holocaust museums and memorials from across the world. The most representative countr...

The use of digital technologies and social media has become an increasingly significant means for engagement in many fields, and that of cultural heritage is no exception. Specifically, Holocaust museums have long been committed to providing historical and educational content to their audiences, and to this end digital communication channels and so...

In this study, we adopt an ecological perspective to reflect on how a specific Italian school cluster adapted to the challenges of the COVID‐19 pandemic by focusing on how students experienced the interplay between continuity and change in school teaching and learning practices caused by the pandemic. Specifically, the study investigates how the sc...

Along with advances in communication technology that are making new forms of historical memorialization and education available, social media are researched as valuable tools for supporting forms of digital memory and for engaging students and teachers about historical knowledge and moral education. This study aims to map the current state of Holoc...

With the passing of the last testimonies, Holocaust remembrance and Holocaust education progressively rely on digital technologies to engage people in immersive, simulative, and even counterfactual memories of the Holocaust. This preliminary study investigates how three prominent Holocaust museums use social media to enhance the general public’s kn...

Despite the documented number of studies that investigate social media in teaching and learning settings, the topic of social media literacy is still an under-researched area. This study adopts the theoretical lens of New Literacy studies to suggest a combined perspective for investigating social media literacies. This perspective considers both so...

Nur wenige Studien haben bis dato untersucht, wie Holocaust-Organisationen Soziale Medien in ihrer Öffentlichkeits- und Bildungsarbeit einsetzen. Diese Studie präsentiert die Resultate einer Literaturrecherche zur Nutzung von sozialen Medien für die Holocaust-Gedenkarbeit und -Erziehung sowie die Ergebnisse einer quantitativen Vorstudie zur Twitter...

In a people-centered perspective, to get smart, a learning ecosystem has to undergo a long evolutionary process involving a combination of co-design, participatory evaluation, and empowering steps, among other things. In this light, design literacy becomes the cornerstone for enabling and supporting this evolutionary path. Digital technologies are...

Die Bedeutung der sozialen Netzwerke als Mittel zum Aus¬druck der eigenen Identität und zur gemeinschaftlichen Teilhabe wächst weiter¬hin, vor allem in den jüngeren Generationen. Partizipationspraktiken verschiede¬ner Art deuten auf eine Verschmelzung zwischen dem formellen Bildungsbereich und dem informellen Alltagskontext der Jugendlichen hin. Ne...

Purpose While the ubiquity of social media as a mode of communication, collaboration, connection and creativity has been widely adopted in journalism, entertainment, healthcare and others, the field of education has been more reticent to integrate social media for teaching and learning purposes. This paper aims to summarize research on how social m...

Commercial social media are being increasingly adopted in formal learning settings even though they have not been conceived specifically for education. Whereas highly popular social services like Facebook and Twitter have been thoroughly investigated for their benefits for teaching and learning in higher education, other social media platforms whic...

The book includes high-quality papers presented at the 4th International Conference on Smart Learning Ecosystems and Regional Development at Università Roma Tor Vergata, Italy, from 22 to 24 May, 2019. Providing insights into the relevance of smart learning ecosystems (schools, campuses, the workplace, informal learning contexts, etc.) for regional...

Social media has attracted considerable scholarly interest. Previous research has demonstrated the need for a more comprehensive overview of social media research across diverse disciplines. However, there is a lack of research that identifies the scope of social media integration across educational settings and how it relates to research in other...

Educators increasingly teach with social media in varied ways, but they may do so without considering the ways in which social media corporations profit from their uses or compromise transparency, equity, health, safety, and democracy through the design of platforms. There is a lack of scholarship that addresses the curricular topics that educators...

In the landscape of Open Science, Open Data (OD) plays a crucial role as data are one of the most basic components of research, despite their diverse formats across scientific disciplines. Opening up data is a recent concern for policy makers and researchers, as the basis for good Open Science practices. The common factor underlying these new pract...

In historical memory education, digital technologies are gaining momentum and becoming influential in enhancing the general public's knowledge and understanding of historical events such as genocides and war atrocities. Holocaust remembrance centres and Holocaust museums have had a solid presence on the Internet for considerable time now, curating...

Social network sites are increasingly becoming instruments for expression of personal identity and collective participation, especially for younger generations. Participatory practices of various kinds are frequently leading to contamination between the different spheres of youngsters' lives, including areas of formal and informal learning contexts...

Academic social network sites (ASNS) like ResearchGate and Academia.edu can be analysed as techno-cultural systems through which researchers perform a number of tasks and roles that can be collectively defined as digital scholarship. This study sets out to map empirical Spanish-language research studies on the use of ResearchGate and Academia.edu a...

Academic social network sites (ASNS) like ResearchGate and Academia.edu can be analysed as techno-cultural systems through which researchers perform a number of tasks and roles that can be collectively defined as digital scholarship. This study sets out to map empirical Spanish-language research studies on the use of ResearchGate and Academia.edu a...

Lo sviluppo e la diffusione dei social network (SN) costituisce uno dei fenomeni più rilevanti della recente storia delle tecnologie digitali e dell’avvento del Web 2.0. Secondo alcune recenti indagini condotte negli USA, il 52% degli adulti utilizza uno o più social media e quasi i 2/3 usano i social network (Duggan et al., 2015; Perrin, 2015). Tu...

La diffusione su larga scala dell'alternanza scuola-lavoro, a seguito della recente estensione a tutte le scuole secondarie di secondo grado, ha contribuito a mettere prepotentemente al centro dell'attenzione pubblica il tema della preparazione dei giovani per il loro futuro ingresso nel mondo del lavoro. Mentre negli istituti tecnici e professiona...

ResearchGate and Academia.edu have been increasingly acknowledged as the most popular academic social network sites (ASNS) for scholarly communication. Along with their benefits for supporting communication and knowledge sharing within academic communities, concerns over quality and credibility remain a pertinent issue. In terms of research investi...

This special issue is devoted to the theme “Reshaping professional learning in the social media landscape: theories, practices and challenges”. The rise of social media has been one of the most significant phenomena to emerge in recent years and concerns not only their near ubiquitous use by young people, but also their widespread adoption by adult...

Academic social network sites (ASNS) like ResearchGate and Academia.edu are digital platforms for information sharing and systems for open dissemination of scholarly practices that are gaining momentum among researchers of multiple disciplines. Although ASNS are increasingly transforming scholarly practices and academic identity, a unifying theoret...

In recent years, there has been increasing emphasis on the benefits of social media and social network sites to foster young people's participation in digital public spaces and their civic engagement. Using the principles of the Student Voice approach, this study investigated the use of a Facebook group to support secondary school students’ voices...

Digital technology and social media are progressively transforming scholarly practices and academic identity into what has been named digital scholarship. However, while specific approaches to the topic have been adopted within diverse research strands, a unifying theoretical framework has yet to emerge and as a result the topic is advancing with s...

Despite their growing popularity, there are many contradictory arguments between supporters and detractors of MOOCs. Nevertheless, the advent of mass-scale online courses is increasingly credited to have the potential to reshape higher education significantly over time, and recent research analyses how and in which ways such a potential can be leve...

Research on scholars' use of social media suggests that these sites are increasingly being used to enhance scholarly communication by strengthening relationships, facilitating collaboration among peers, publishing and sharing research products, and discussing research topics in open and public formats. However, very few studies have investigated pe...

This conceptual paper deals with some of the implications that the use of social network sites, though not originally developed and conceived for learning purposes, have for schools and academic activities when they are used as tools able to modify and innovate teaching/learning practices and academic culture. Beside the differences that characteri...

Social media are increasingly perceived as powerful drivers of change for research practices, in terms of openness, sharing and sociability. Numerous studies have reported benefits and factors affecting the progressive adoption of these sites especially for scholarly communication. However, extensive studies that are carried out with large samples...

The proliferation of social network sites (SNS) has been one of the most influential phenomena in the last decade especially among young people. Recent surveys that have investigated the use of these sites by teens reported that they go online daily and almost constantly, facilitated by the widespread availability of smartphones. However, the value...

Nonostante la crescente popolarità dei social network (SN) tra diversi strati della popolazione, solo pochi studi hanno esaminato le potenzialità di questi ambienti digitali come strumenti di inclusione sociale per le persone con disabilità. Questo studio presenta i risultati di un questionario online somministrato a persone con disabilità nel cont...

This study provides an updated critical review of the literature on Facebook as a technology‐enhanced learning environment based on papers published between 2012 and 2015. It adopts a revised classification of the categories identified in a previous study, which emphasized three main Facebook affordances – mixing information and learning resources,...

Introduction: Despite the growing popularity of social network sites (SNS) among several sectors of the population, only a few studies have investigated how these digital environments can be powerful tools of social inclusion for disabled people. This study presents the results of an online survey administered to disabled people in Italy with the a...

Le scienze dell’apprendimento

Today, the information gathered from massive learning platforms and social media sites allow deriving a very comprehensive set of learning information. To this aim, data mining techniques can surely help to gain proper insights, personalize learning experiences, formative assessments, performance measurements, as well as to develop new learning and...

This study aims at providing empirical evidence on how higher education scholars are using Social Media for personal, teaching and professional purposes. A survey tool was addressed to the entire Italian academic staff, with a response rate of 10.5% corresponding to 6139 responses. The study takes into account a number of sociodemographic variables...

The aim of this chapter is to highlight the role that metaphors and figurative language may play in virtual learning environments that are based on written communication. In these contexts they may satisfy cognitive, emotional and affective needs of learning. Research results achieved so far show that metaphors, establishing meaningful analogies am...

In recent years, interest in the potential of social media and social networking sites for young people’s participation in public spaces has gained momentum. These media have been seen as adequate to support the development of participatory culture. However, some studies have questioned their participatory power and demonstrated that online partici...

Lo studio che viene qui presentato è nato dall’esigenza di effettuare una ricognizione sulla diffusione dei social network presso le persone con disabilità in Italia. L’indagine è stata realizzata con l’obiettivo di rilevare le maggiori potenzialità e criticità che questi ambienti rivestono per queste persone, con particolare riguardo per le più fr...

Assumendo come framework teorico l’approccio Student Voice, l’articolo presenta una ricerca che ha inteso verificare se un ambiente come quello di Facebook possa essere utilizzato per dare voce agli studenti di un istituto superiore in relazione alle loro idee sulla scuola, con lo scopo di renderli protagonisti dei processi di miglioramento della q...

Assumendo come framework teorico l’approccio Student Voice, l’articolo presenta una ricerca che ha inteso verificare se un ambiente come quello di Facebook possa essere utilizzato per dare voce agli studenti di un istituto superiore in relazione alle loro idee sulla scuola, con lo scopo di renderli protagonisti dei processi di miglioramento della q...

This paper reports the results of a survey addressed to Italian academic scholars with the aim of identifying the teaching uses of Social Media in the field of university teaching practices. To this end, a survey instrument, already administered in the USA, was translated and adapted, and then sent to the entire Italian university scholar populatio...

This paper describes an experience where the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) has been adapted for use in the evaluation of methodological and technological innovations determined by the introduction of a new e-learning system in an Italian online university. While the original TAM allows one to assess acceptance and adoption of a new technology,...

Facebook has received considerable attention in a number of research areas. However, its educational value has not been fully confirmed and results from the mainstream educational paradigms are contradictory. A number of experiences related to the educational use of Facebook as a technology-enhanced learning environment are also flourishing. In the...

The need for higher educational systems to undergo a radical process of innovation is recognized worldwide, but how such a process has to be triggered, managed and sustained is far from being fixed. The paper illustrates the case study of a small Italian online university where a number of actions (i.e. a preliminary analysis of the existing system...

Lo studio che viene qui presentato nasce dall’esigenza di effettuare una ricognizione sulla diffusione dei Social Media nel panorama universitario italiano. In particolare, ci si è posti l’intento di tracciare una mappa degli usi personali, didattici e professionali dei Social Media da parte del personale di ricerca di tutte le università italiane....

The widespread diffusion of social network sites and network technologies in the construction of online relationships poses a set of questions about the nature of our affective and romantic relationships, about what we expect from them and about how these relationships affect our daily lives. Two very recent contributions from the film industry, Ca...

The paper reports the main results of a survey addressed to Italian academic scholars with the aim of researching how the latter use Social Media tools for personal, teaching and professional purposes. The survey, which was adapted and translated from a previous questionnaire, was administered to the entire Italian university scholar population and...

Social media and social networking sites are progressively gaining attention also in relation to professional development and life-long learning for school and academic teachers and staff. In particular, social media and social networking sites are emerging as places in which to cultivate different forms of social capital, bridging and bonding, tha...

Despite its continuing popularity as the social network site par excellence, the educational value of Facebook has not been fully determined, and results from the mainstream educational paradigms are contradictory, with some scholars emphasizing its pedagogical affordances (e.g., widening context of learning, mixing information and learning resourc...

Above and beyond actual skills, teachers' beliefs and attitudes are the key factors for the effective integration of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) into instructional practices and can be measured through Niederhauser and Perkmen (2008)'s Intrapersonal Technology Integration Scale (ITIS). This study aimed at providing an Italian ada...

This paper describes the process of boosting an innovative e-learning system in an online university in Italy. The system relies on a satellite-terrestrial telecommunication infrastructure and allows for different interaction types, including synchronous, asynchronous, textual, audio and video communication modes. The adoption of this infrastructur...

Maria Beatrice Ligorio, Stefano Cacciamani Psicologia dell’educazione ISBN: 9780465010219 Carocci editore | 2013 | 343 pagine

Questo lavoro presenta i risultati di due indagini esplorative sull’uso dei SN nell’ambito di alcune comunità professionali di insegnanti. Un primo studio basato sulla somministrazione di un questionario rivolto a dieci fondatori e amministratori di gruppi online ha investigato le motivazioni, le finalità e i livelli di partecipazione. Un secondo s...

Over recent years, the notions of identity, credibility and trust in digital contexts have been gaining renewed interest from scholars in different fields (from social studies to engineering and computer science), especially for their consequences for privacy and security. Emerging and urgent questions are: What does the management of online person...

Oltre alle competenze effettivamente possedute, le credenze e gli atteggiamenti degli insegnanti relativamente all’impiego delle Tecnologie dell’Informazione e della Comunicazione (TIC) giocano un ruolo fondamentale nell’integrazione di questi strumenti nei diversi contesti educativi. Questi atteggiamenti possono essere misurati mediante la Intrape...

Manca S, Ranieri M. (2013). I social network nell’apprendimento. TD – Tecnologie Didattiche, 21 (3). Supplemento al numero dal titolo "Pedagogia nell'era digitale" (a cura di Vittorio Midoro e Donatella Persico), Menabò, Ortona.

Nella storia recente delle tecnologie digitali uno dei fenomeni più significativi è stato quello della nascita dei cosiddetti social media e, in particolare, dei social network. L’ampia diffusione di queste tecnologie sta sollevando nuovi interrogativi anche sul versante educativo. Trattandosi di artefatti che mediano le relazioni sociali e l’acces...

Nonostante la crescente popolarità di Facebook anche come strumento didattico, le sue potenzialità in chiave educativa non sono state ancora del tutto esplorate, né c'è consenso unanime sulle criticità che emergono nel momento in cui le pratiche della cultura partecipativa dei social media si combinano con le esigenze dell'apprendimento formale. In...

The need for higher educational systems to undergo a radical process of innovation is recognized worldwide, but how such a process has to be triggered, managed and sustained is far from being fixed. The paper illustrates the case study of a small Italian online university where a number of actions (i.e. a preliminary analysis of the existing system...

To date, little empirical research on professional use of social network sites has been conducted, particularly with reference to groups of teachers on F acebook. The paper presents the results of two surveys addressed to the founders of five I talian F acebook groups and their members ( n = 1107), with the aim of investigating mechanisms underlyin...

This special issue aims at exploring educational and socio-cultural perspectives on the use of the increasing convergence of mobile devices and digital media for social networking in formal and informal contexts of learning. It originated from the work of the Theme Team SoMobNet (Social Mobile Networking for Informal Learning; http://www.somobnet.e...