Principles Of Digital Scaffolding In The Square Documentary Film

The Netflix documentary The Square centers on the Egyptian Revolution that occured in 2011. The film depicts a group of revolutionaries that attempt to gather protesters in order to fight against the regime. The setting of the film is the one of the country’s most monumental area, Tahrir Square and the film records significant events that took place during the revolution in the span of two years.

Throughout the film, the influence of media is constantly used as a outlet to gain more followers for the revolution. The film applies the six phases of scaffolding, a concept introduced by Philip Howard and Muzammil Hussain. The six phase scaffolding consists of preparation, ignition, street protests, international buy-in, climax and a follow-on information welfare. Each principle of digital scaffolding is seen in the film and plays a significant role in the revolution’s outcome, by using the media to organize political movement. Howard and Hussain lists preparation as a beginning step to digital scaffolding.

Hussain and Howard defines preparation as a method of “using digital media in creative ways to find eachother, build solidarity around shared grievance and, identify collective political goals”. This step of digital scaffolding is seen multiple times throughout the film. In the beginning of the film, various clips are viewed on social media platforms such as Youtube and Facebook. We see a man getting beaten and tasered by the police, along with women getting tortured. In one clip, the beaten corpse of Khaled Said is seen on the Facebook platform. Howard and Hussain mention the Said was a blogger who was beaten to death by the police shortly after exposing their corruption. This image was seen all over the internet in many digital platforms, and thus evoked a sense of “shared grievance” amongst viewers.

The film the cuts to an Egyptian woman calling many to Tahrir Square to fight against the regime and corruption. This is a form of preparation where social media is used to form a political movement. The next phase of digital scaffolding is ignition. Ignition is defined as an incident that the state-run media attempts to ignores but gains attention through digital media and thus, enrages the public. At one point in the film, Ramy Essam, a musician in the revolution was taken to a museum. At the museum he was brutally beaten by the army and had his hair cut. The video was uploaded online as a testimony to the injustice of the armed forces.

Another form of ignition was when the army began running people over with tanks. Mina Daniel, died because of the incident and many mourned over his death. His death also enraged the public and many created banners and posters of his face. They demanded justice for those who died during the tank incident and the attack was filmed gaining the attention of many.