Roots and Cyberspace: Linking the Ruthenian Diaspora

Paper given by Daniel Winfree Papuga at the conference "Postkommunismens Antropologi", 12-14 April 1996, Department of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen

..."Is there a difference between the imagination of the diasporic community as represented by printed media, and that of the �virtual community� of the web? I would say that the answer is both yes and no. Before the second world war, Walter Benjamin was already saying that mass media could be an alternative to face to face interaction for creating community. Once access to public media became available to all, the gap between author and public would become blurred: "At any moment the reader is ready to turn into a writer" (Benjamin 1979:398)..."

Read the paper at Anthrobase.com