Diaspora Journalism and Turkey’s Virtual “Imagined Communities”: Syrian Media

The media provides a field of self-expression for individuals, as well as an area for them to announce other avenues of self-expression they’re participating in. Individuals usually express their thoughts and feelings at moments of solitude when they are away from their loved ones and their homeland. Such themes of longing, alienation, solitude, connection, home, and separation are quite often the subject of literature and songs. Those who live far from their homeland, or who have been forced to do so, are more attuned to the events unfolding “back home,” and more sensitive to the plight of their fellow citizens. Even the most ordinary news from their homeland can be an exciting piece of information. This study is linked to the author’s own journeys, and its timing was made more fitting by the earthquake. The author has distilled her own knowledge and views from the ocean of existing literature available to them and brought them together. This article examines every aspect of the concept of the diaspora; its main focus is to showcase how a displaced community living in a foreign county has attempted to create a network of mass communication. As well as investigating the profiles and the eco-politics of six Syrian-origin media companies based in Turkey, interviews with directors and employees reveal the views on diaspora media of those who fled to Turkey as a result of the “Arab Spring” rebellion. Turkey has always been a land of migration due to its geographical location, but this is perhaps the first time in its history that it has been so closely acquainted with the concept of diaspora media.