Guzel Yusupova1; 1 RANEPA North-West Institute of Management, UK
Discussion
This paper focuses on how everyday online communication engages people in nationalism as a way of seeing the world and as a way of expressing their vision of shared collective identity. In other words, how online communication effects the guarding and reproducing the boundaries of national community and challenging the conventional boundaries by simple personal actions in social media. Like, for example, participation in evaluation of songs of annual international song contest that is broadcasted on YouTube. This addresses the case of public reception of Manizha’s song ‘Russian woman’ on Eurovision Song contest in 2021 since it touches topics such national, migrant and hybrid identities, racial inequality and gender issues, and many other questions of identity politics. Building on the case of public reception of Manizha’s song on Eurovision 2021 and its impact on negotiation of national identity and symbolics I argue that digital technologies create new opportunities for ordinary people to participate in the national community construction and online connective action over challenging matters of national identity. In other words, I argue that nationalism became even more engaging and entertaining in the digital age due to omnipresent simplicity of interaction with a nation and over national issues in digital domain.
