Author: Negar Mottahedeh

NEGAR MOTTAHEDEH is an Associate Professor of Literature and of Women’s Studies at Duke University. Follow her updates at negaratduke on Twitter. Many thanks to Talinn Grigor, Michael Murphy, Liss Nup, Sara Saljooghi, and Stephen Shalom for their valuable comments on this essay.

Green Is the New Green: Social Media and the Post-Election Crisis in Iran, 2009

The Persian language blogosphere is rich, varied, and dynamic. Of the 100 million blogs registered around the world in 2005, 700,000 were Persian language, either inside Iran or in the diaspora. Of these, over 60,000 are updated frequently. With over 20 million Iranians connecting to the internet, and over 600,000 Iranians signed up on Facebook by the presidential election of the summer of 2009, the Iranian cyber community is by far the most dynamic such community in the Middle East, and one that is unambiguously diverse.

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