This chapter in Baym's book gave me a new perspective on what the definition of a community could be. There appears to be two sides to this argument; one that believes that a strong community can only exist when there is physical social interaction (such as in a local community), and one that believes a community can thrive when people are using technology to communicate (via social network platforms). For me, this definition can be very fluid. However, I do agree that within any type of community, there always exists little subsets, or smaller groups who have more mutually-agreed-upon norms than those of the entire community.
When considering the subsets that exist in communities, two clear examples come to mind. First, I think of the community that Twitter has build over the years. The large community that can be considered here would be all of the users on the platform; anyone who has an account, no matter their degree of usage. There are tons of possibilities that can be taken into consideration when considering all of the subsets that could exist on the platform. Twitter is an extremely customizable social network, so the amounts of subsets are limitless. For example, a subset could be as simple as the group of people who all follow the same celebrity. These users all have the same tweets appear from that celebrity as they scroll through their twitter feed, and therefore all carry the same knowledge about that celebrity. Another subset that exists on Twitter is the people who follow certain hashtags. Similar to the previous example, these people are all gaining the same knowledge about the specific information that is relevant to that hashtag.
A second example that comes to my mind regarding communities is right here on campus. All of the people that associate with Saint Michael's College (whether they are students, staff, faculty, or alumni) can be considered the large community. All of these people can then be broken down into subsets, based on their interests and involvements on campus.
I agree that subsets that exist within a larger community are interesting to consider. Some websites rely entirely on subsets, such as Reddit, which is a main website that offers thousands of "subreddits" on any given topic such as a TV show or a celebrity. I like how you consider subsets in the context of social media networks, something that I never thought about before, especially in the case of Twitter. Whenever you go to a Twitter profile, Twitter shows you which of your followers also follow that profile.
ReplyDeleteEmily, great post. You and Kylian both raise interesting points about subsets. These subsets within the social media world are where we begin to see what Baym refers to as diffused but centralized social networks. Users with similar interests exist in different subsets throughout various online communities, creating a networked web of interaction on various platforms.
ReplyDeleteYou bring up good examples of what different subsets can be present in both online and physical communities. Even social media campaigns for causes such as #DStrong have been popular among platforms such as Twitter, and there are many small organizations within a college campus. Its interesting how the term "community" can be defined but also how there are different varieties of communities that can alter the definition of "community"
ReplyDeleteI like how you discuss subsets of communities, I feel as though these subsets of communities are of importance in creating a sense of belonging within a community, allowing members to feel comfortable, regardless of what the community is formed upon.
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