Where is the ethnic minority presence in cyberspace? In this book, Linda Leung makes a pioneering exploration of ethnic minority presence in cyberspace. She finds that despite the apparent white, Western, male, middle class profile of cyberspace, there is significant ethnic minority activity. The work draws on the author’s empirical research amongst ethnic minority women and incorporates discussion of media and web-texts from the US, Canada, Britain and Australia. This is a fascinating interdisciplinary examination of the web-participation of ethnic communities, which sheds light on how ethnic identities are articulated in cyberspace and contemporary society in both predictable and surprising ways.
Biography
Linda Leung is Senior Lecturer in the Institute for Interactive Media and Learning, at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia.
’Linda Leung addresses questions too often sidestepped or ignored when it comes to New Media. Her specific and focused study has important implications in terms of a critique of the racialised and ethnocentric character of the [world-wide web]. Never overstated, her work demands a change of minds and practice. That she presents her critique through evidence, discussion, interaction and engagement, and does so with style and grace, and with a never rushed urgency, makes this book an indispensable guide.’ John Hutnyk, Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK ’This book engages media theory across television, film and the internet in relation to race and ethnicity, thus allowing a historically contextual and nuanced understanding of the interplay of virtuality and ethnicity, online and offline. Leung lays out the complexity of absences and presences of racialized bodies' works in relation to the internet. Her work addresses gaps in what has thus far been a mostly US-centric approach to race in cyberspace.’ Radhika Gajjala, Bowling Green State University, USA
