Facebook: Online Public Space of Shan Migrants in Thailand

Abstract

 The aim of this paper is to understand “facebook” in term of the online public space of the Shan migrant workers in Thailand. The study finds that the Shan migrant worker’s online public space is not on the spotlight of Thai state power. Therefore, this space has become an open space for communicating among Shan society. Shan workers in Thailand are connected through facebook which in turn has become a sizeable online community. Several social activities and relationships are created via these online public space. Moreover, the ways in which they define themselves for what it means to be Shan on facebook are different from what Thai state and Shan elites have defined them.

Even though Shan migrant worker’s online public space is not space where Thai state exercises its full control and power, the study illustrates that new forms of power relations have emerged on facebook. Several groups of users have attempted to define and police what it meant to be Shan living in Thailand. Facebook has become contested space of Shan representations.