Atanasova, Deyana

Senior, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences

Major: Economics

Minor: Professional Writing

Thesis Director: Laura J. Owen, Department of Economics

Faculty Reader: Martha Martinez-Firestone, Department of Sociology

Bio: During her (almost) 3 years before graduating from DePaul, Deyana worked as a peer writing tutor at the University Center for Writing-based Learning and as an institutional ethnography research assistant alongside Dr. Workman, Dr. Vandenberg, and Maddy Crozier. She also wrote for and/or worked on several publications at DePaul, including Honorable Mentions, Crook & Folly, Mille-Feuille, and Creating Knowledge. Her passion for interdisciplinarity and social justice fueled her research, and she hopes to keep writing as a lifelong learner in her professional life.

Abstract: This thesis explores blurring lines between economic and social capital by constructing a quantitative and qualitative case study of tweets from the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement. As a “vehicle” site of study, Venmo’s social features may deem it a useful tool in supporting sociopolitical and economic movements by way of economic and social exchange, drawing connections between affinity spaces and blending economic and social capital. Through an NVivo analysis of 92 tweets containing the search terms “Venmo” and “#BlackLivesMatter,” 10affinity spaces were identified which exemplified social capital as a central focus alongside the exchange of economic capital.