#CreatorsForDiversity
POV: you are a museum trying to engage with gen z
What opportunities are hidden for digital cultural education between dance tutorials and life hacks on TikTok?
The social media platform TikTok has long been home not only to dance tutorials, but also to a variety of educational content, different perspectives from diverse communities, and well-researched explainer videos. However, the information, stories and gags are packaged in a fundamentally different way than on related platforms like Instagram and Facebook. By design, the app is all about discovery: from supermarket choreography to in-depth conversations with yourself, from BookTok to WitchTok. Performed in a never-ending, algorithmic feed that is automatically curated for its users even before they subscribe to a single channel. The platform creates viral trends from sounds that are available to all users: one idea, thousands of versions. Copying is not only allowed on TikTok, it's encouraged. But how can museums, newspapers or news stations contribute to the inexhaustible ForYou page?
Since July 2021, ZKM | Karlsruhe has been exploring the platform for its potential for art and cultural institutions and experimenting with how digital cultural education can be implemented on the app. Through TikTok Germany's #CreatorsForDiversity funding project, in which a total of 50 institutions participated, more than 100 videos on contemporary issues around culture, artificial intelligence, diversity, gender bias, exhibitions and their artists:inside were created by February 2022. The goal of the grant was to continue to contribute to culture during the Covid 19 pandemic and to enable people to engage with issues around culture and diversity. Through the numerous videos, internal training opportunities, and many collaborations, the house was enriched with new perspectives and expertise. As a result of the grant, many different people have been able to contribute to #CreatorsForDiversity by bringing their perspectives and experiences that the House and our community can learn from.
The fastest growing social media platform has fundamentally changed the way people consume and produce digitally. Understanding the visual storytelling of TikTok and making sense of it as a cultural institution is a task and an opportunity that ZKM wants to take advantage of to enable more cultural participation in social media.