Virtual Diaspora?: Imagining Croatia On-line

Paul Stubbs

Sociological Research Online, 1999, vol. 4, issue 2, 62-74

Abstract: This article, concentrating on contemporary Croatia, explores the role of computer-mediated communication in new relationships between the homeland at war and diaspora. Computer mediated diasporic public spheres are discussed as forms of creative imaginings of a national space from diverse global sites. The text is critical of any suggestion that diasporic identifications are able to be read off, simplistically, from dominant forms of homeland nationalism. Through an exploration of the socio-historical bases of Croatian diaspora communities, and the complexities of callings from the homeland in the 1990s, a more nuanced picture of contestation emerges. A ‘netnography’ of the Soc/Culture/Croatia newsgroup reveals a dominant habitus of processes, forms and content, in particular, the construction of Croatian identity in relation to a, more or less, monolithic ‘Other’ but, also, emerging innovative currents. More work on diasporic affinities as complex, contingent, and fluid is clearly needed, with political as well as theoretical importance.

Keywords: Computer Mediated Communication; Croatia; Diaspora; Netnography; Soc/Culture/Croatia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:socres:v:4:y:1999:i:2:p:62-74

DOI: 10.5153/sro.253

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