Towards an instagrammical archaeogenealogy: shadowbanning as a technology of algorithmic governmentality

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5007/1984-8412.2026.e112360

Keywords:

Foucauldian discourse studies, Algorithms, Shadowbanning, Instagram, Marginalized bodies

Abstract

In the year that marks the centenary of Michel Foucault, this article demonstrates the productivity of his theoretical framework for examining the algorithmic society of the twenty-first century. We aim to map the phenomenon of shadowbanning on Instagram, highlighting its effects on the circulation of discourses concerning historically marginalized bodies and voices. Drawing on a Foucauldian approach, this study conceptualizes shadowbanning as a way of governing the sensible or, in Foucault’s terms (2014), as a microphysics of visibility: a form of power that operates not through direct prohibition, but through the modulation of attention, the rarefaction of circulation, and the differential administration of the field of the visible and the sayable. Anchored in an archaeogenealogical perspective, the research mobilizes concepts such as governmentality, dispositif (apparatus), and regimes of truth to analyze how algorithmic systems participate in the contemporary production of Instagram invisibility. The methodological approach consisted of a discursive mapping of a corpus composed of publications on the Instagram profile of content creator Tricia Wise (@safeslut), whose recurring experience of reduced reach allows us to examine shadowbanning not only as a technical mechanism of exclusion, but as a discursive event in which tensions between power, regimes of truth, and practices of resistance in algorithmic society are condensed. The findings indicate that the invisibilization of Instagram profiles constitutes a technology of government articulated with the algorithmic modulation of circulation, through which attention and the conditions of possibility of enunciation on the platform are regulated. It is concluded that algorithmic governmentality differentially distributes attention, legitimacy, and possibilities of enunciation, thereby (re)inscribing historical inequalities under the guise of technical neutrality.

Author Biographies

Laís Sousa Di Lauro, Universidade Federal da Paraíba/PROLING

PhD candidate in Linguistics at the Federal University of Paraíba (PROLING/UFPB), in the Discourse research track, with a sandwich period at NOVA University Lisbon (UNL/PT). Holds a Master’s degree in Media Studies from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (PPGEM/UFRN), in the Media Studies and Meaning Production research track. She is a researcher in the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Discursive Practices and Body Politics (CORPOLÍTICA/UFRN) and in the Circle for Discussions in Discourse Analysis (CIDADI/UFPB).

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Social Communication with a major in Journalism from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, also with a sandwich period at NOVA University Lisbon (UNL/PT). Her research interests include Instagram, discourse, the body, beauty, femininity, digital media, gender, and subjectivities. She has professional experience in advertising, digital marketing, press advisory, and political consulting.

Regina Baracuhy, Universidade Federal da Paraíba/PROLING

Regina Baracuhy is a Professor at the Federal University of Paraíba (UFPB), where she supervises research at the undergraduate (Scientific Initiation), Master’s, and PhD levels. She is affiliated with the Department of Portuguese Language and Linguistics (DLPL) and is a permanent faculty member of the Graduate Program in Linguistics (PROLING/UFPB). She completed her postdoctoral studies in Linguistics at the Federal University of Uberlândia (UFU) in 2023 and holds a PhD in Linguistics and Portuguese Language from São Paulo State University (UNESP–Araraquara, 2004). She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Letters (1987) and her Master’s degree in Portuguese Language (1994) from the Federal University of Paraíba.

Her theoretical and methodological approach is grounded in Foucauldian Discourse Studies. Her research focuses on discourse, subjectivity, governmentality, and resistance movements in digital media, as well as the cartography of urban spaces. She is a member of the Foucauldian Discourse Studies Working Group of ANPOLL and coordinates the interinstitutional research group CIDADI – Circle for Discussions in Discourse Analysis (UFPB/CNPq), which brings together faculty researchers from several Brazilian universities across the country, including UEM, UNESP–Araraquara, UNICENTRO, UnB, UFPA, UNIFESSPA, UNIR, UEFS, UFRN, UFERSA, UERN, UFMA, UFCG, and UEPB.

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Published

2026-10-06

Issue

Vol. 23 (2026)

Section

Dossiê | 100 Foucault 2: o filósofo, seu pensamento e o discurso

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