Cosmonational Digital Public Sphere

• In Event: 549 - Section on International Migration Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 04. Transnationalism

Abstract

The role of information technology in the making and functioning of a cosmonation (homeland and diaspora constituting a distributed social formation) is investigated through interrogating the experiences of groups such as Italian Americans, Croatian Americans, and Armenian Americans and by focusing on various digital outlets, including print media, online television, radio, telephone, and the Internet, in order to show various ways IT has contributed to the process. The discussion is framed within the context of the debate on the public sphere and the literature on diaspora and information technology, the so-called digital diaspora. The digitalization of crossborder practices provides a way to explain how the practices are undertaken with the use of specific digital devices. This paper shows how certain factors such as literacy, access to the Internet, and ownership of cellphones can facilitate or hamper linkages among sites, the frequency of connections, and the operability of the cosmonation as a crossborder network of sites.

Author

• Michel S. Laguerre, Univ of California-Berkeley