In a few sentences, describe your online identity during your:

childhood:

adolescence:

adulthood:

What does it mean to be a diasporic person today?
Diaspora, in many ways, is used as a default word to describe a group of people living apart from their birthplace, but has been recontextualized from generation to generation.

This workshop expands on questions I used in a survey to explore how identity differ from our online and offline selves. Growing up Korean-Canadian, there were many parts of my culture I did not understand. Attempting to define this, I heard the word diaspora being used often. I could not relate this term because how could someone like me, being born in Canada, feel a longing for a country I have never visited?

Does home constitute a geographical location?

This prompted me to wonder if anybody else were thinking similar thoughts.
I designed a survey that asked diasporic people about their modes of communication as a way of expressing and diving deeper into their cultural identity, and then reworked the survey questions into a workshop.

I use a mixed methodology of narrative inquiry and participatory action research (PAR) as a way of gathering rich narratives in a detailed survey that covered topics that range from but not limited to diaspora, transnational identities, belonging and communication. Then, I conducted one-on-one interviews of participants, expanding on specific parts of the survey.

This workshop expands on specific questions of the survey, allowing participants to use simple drawing techniques to “map” their responses.
At the end of the workshop, we shared our responses in groups of 4-5 people.

Something I learned from conducting these interviews is that the diaspora my parents’ generation and mine experience are widely different. I believe this is due to the strong influence of the internet throughout our childhood.

Many of the survey responses mentioned that they learned more about their culture through television shows, movies, online forums and websites.

While collecting survey responses, I realized how many of us immigrant kin subconsciously develop a digital toolkit. These digital tools are used as an outlet to discover and freely express our hybrid identities, parts of ourselves we do not understand and want to uncover in a way that speaks to us. Through online forums and communities, we find a sense of belonging and shared understanding.