In recent coverage of the kidnapping of the 274 Nigerian schoolgirls, analysts and experts have begun to turn on the very tool that brought the issue to light: the hashtag. As with major hashtag activism like the (botched) #Kony2012 campaign, the issue of whether or not this kind of movement makes an impact has erupted once again amongst activists and techies alike. “...these are as Islamist terrorists who are intent on killing people based on their Christian belief. And in the case of these girls, look, a hashtag #BringBackOurGirls isn't going to cut it, ” Republican strategist Ron Christie said on NPR. 

Those individuals who are identified with Boko Haram do not refer to themselves as Boko Haram. Boko Haram, in the local Hausa language, means something along the line of, “Western education is forbidden.” It’s a term applied to them by residents in the communities in which the movement arose in the early 2000s, in the northeast of Nigeria. They refer to themselves differently, as Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad (People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad).