‘He Doesn't Know it’s Facebook: Exploring How Older Karen Migrants in Victoria Communicate Transnationally

• In Event: Caring across Borders: Materiality and Belonging in Transnational Families I

Abstract

This paper considers the ways in which older Karen humanitarian visa migrants living in regional Victoria, Australia identify – or do not identify – as social media users when using Facebook and other platforms for transnational familial communication. Drawing from qualitative interviews with Karen migrants aged over 50 and their younger relatives (conducted as part of the Baldassar and Wilding ARC Discovery Project, Ageing and New Media), this paper explores how interviewees’ individual sense of a digital self might affect the frequency and quality of their interactions with family living in Southeast Asia. Miller and Madianou’s concept of polymedia provides a framework in which to, first, explore various forms of social media use among the sample group and, second, consider to what extent – if at all – interviewees are aware it is social media, such as video calls via Facebook Messenger, they are using to communicate. If access to polymedia is an important component of transnational familial wellbeing, how does identifying – or not identifying – as a social media user affect the frequency and quality of online interactions among transnational families? In this context, how might not identifying as a social media user reinforce or deepen aversions to technology? To what extent might this increase older migrants’ dependency on younger family members who are better engaged with social media? And where would this leave the bonds that these older migrants -- despite the challenges of transnational familyhood -- would like to see not only survive but flourish?

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Author

• Shane Worrell, La Trobe University