Issues of Nationality within Online Spaces: Online Live Streaming Platforms

This ethnographic report offers insights into the understanding of online communities through the study of the concept of the nation, as discussed by Benedict Anderson (2006). Ethnographic research explores the narratives of nationality that are experienced within an online community that is associated with the practice of online live streaming. This paper also discusses anthropological and non-anthropological methodologies and their importance and usability online. Interaction with interviewees brought to light an understanding of online live streaming as a media product capable of influencing the processes of identity construction in terms of national values. This research thus proves that nations as 'imagined communities' are to be found and analyzed in online communities, where icons such as emotes and memes are used and disseminated as part of the everyday interactions that users undertake in their positions as spectators of live streaming. Nonetheless, this research also struggles with paradoxical understandings of online nationalism, which renders necessary an adaptation to the online setting of established knowledge on the matter.