Community Enclaves and Public Imaginaries: Formations of Asian American Online Identities

This article draws on an 18th-month digital ethnography of Asian American online writers to extend on current theories of digital publics and argues for a broader framework that includes the co-constructing relationship writers have, not only with their digital environments, but also through their ethnic and raced experiences. Additionally, online writing ecologies can be seen as simultaneous and overlapping community and public imaginaries for writers who may need to have multiple audience orientations in order to articulate their ethnic and raced experiences. Ultimately, this article addresses the following questions: How does a particular group of online Asian Americans conceive of the public? Under what conditions do Asian American identities form for these writers? And, how is this Asian American collective shaping their public identity?