Basque researchers publish book on diasporas in the new media age

Andoni Alonso and Pedro J. Oiarzabal, two Basque scholars, have published a new book that delves into the social use of modern communication technology by immigrants and diasporas around the world.

Diasporas in the New Media Age: Identity, Politics, and Community, the first ever book to examine these two subjects, includes eighteen original essays that explore the personal, familial, and social impact of modern communication technology on the populations of European (e.g., Basque), Asian (e.g., Uyghur) African (e.g., Eritrean), Caribbean (e.g., Jamaican), Middle Eastern (e.g., Arab), and Latin American (e.g., Brazilian) emigrants.

Diasporas in the New Media Age also looks at the role and transformation of such concepts as identity, nation, culture, and community in the era of information technology and economic globalization.

The contributors, who represent a number of disciplines and national origins, also take a range of approaches - empirical, theoretical, and rhetorical - and combine case studies with thoughtful analysis

The book, which has been published by the University of Nevada, is both a discussion of the use of communication technologies by various emigrant groups and an engaging account of the immigrant experience in the contemporary world.

It also offers important insights into the ways that dispersed populations are using digital media to maintain ties with their families and homeland, and to create new communities in order to preserve their culture and reinforce their sense of identity.

Both authors have been visiting scholars at the Center for Basque Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno. Pedro J. Oiarzabal is a research scholar at the University of Deusto (Bilbao). He is the author of numerous articles as well as books on migration and identity, including Gardeners of Identity: Basques in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Andoni Alonso is associate professor of philosophy at the University of Extremadura, Spain. He is the author of many articles and books, including Basque Cyberculture: From Digital Euskadi to Cyber Euskalherria.