Moving ethnography online: researching Brazilian migrants' online togetherness

Abstract

This article contributes to recent scholarship on the changing nature of fieldwork practices within migration research, focusing on the practice of online ethnography. It makes a case for the significance of the internet and, more specifically, social network sites, in the experience of many migrants. I state that online togetherness is an integral part of the lives of many migrants which also interrelates with ‘offline’ aspects of their social lives. Therefore, I argue that current research on migration would benefit from a more balanced combination of offline and online ethnography, taking into account how online connectivity affects the nature of migration and the conditions of being a migrant. Methodologically, I suggest that ethnography is well suited for generating understandings of the significance of the internet in the experience of migrants, but that a number of adjustments in methods of data collection and analysis must be made.

Keywords:

• Migration studies
• transnationality
• online ethnography
• social network sites
• online togetherness
• Brazilian migrants

Notes

1. For example: Hine (2000); Mann and Stewart (2000); Landzelius (2006); Bakardjieva (2007), Diminescu and Pasquier (2010).

2. I use the term ‘community’ in this article because it is the name used on Orkut. Even so, defining people's social activities online as an ‘online community’ is not unproblematic, as these so-called ‘communities’ often have low barriers to entry and to exit, and members can easily ignore other members they don't like (Brinkerhoff 2009), and not all of people's online activities live up to the value-laden name of ‘community’ (Bakardjieva 2007). Bakardjieva (2007) proposes instead to use the term ‘virtual togetherness’, as a collective noun for the many variations of people's social activities online. Although I agree with her view about the inappropriateness of the term ‘community’, I also argue that the term ‘virtual’ does not contribute to a better understanding of people's online activities, as it suggests a sharp distinction between the ‘real’ world and the ‘virtual’ world. In contrast to this view, I argue that the internet and its many communication modes have become increasingly and undeniably central for its many users. Therefore, I propose to speak of ‘online togetherness’ rather than ‘virtual togetherness’.

3. Although some Orkut members in the Orkut communities I studied were non-migrants, I will not elaborate on the role of the online migrant communities for non-migrants in this article.