PhD thesis final - Royal Holloway, University of London

Chapter 6 –Grounding belonging in leisure spacewhen I found that there are some raising [insignificant] issues [shaking his head], I willthrow out some serious issues to facilitate discussions or at least let them to have differentthinking. For example, not long ago, I posted a question entitled ‘what else we can do inKunshan?‘ It turned out to get a great response. I think such discussion is for everybody‘sgood.As the excerpt shows, the issues discussed on this forum are also place-specific andrelated to the real world matters; this in turn makes the space particularly meaningfuland relevant to the participants‘ lives and emotions. Even though some of myparticipants told me that they prefer to be an invisible visitor and just catch up what ishappening or get the information they need from others, most of them indicated thatthey would also like to be both a receiver and giver of information. As Lydia, anadministration personnel, in her late 30s said, ‗it happens naturally; it is very hard forme not to share my experience when I know somebody desperately needs to knowsomething that I have knowledge of.‘ My respondents who are members of this onlineforum consider the forum as a space in which mutual benefits can be experienced andwhere reciprocity is practised.Furthermore, the interactions that take place on the forum and the forum itself are alsoappreciated for their ability to help forge ties amongst its users. As the most well-knownportal site for Taiwanese living in China (Chen 2008), this Taiwanese-dominated onlinecommunity is also a place for Taiwanese people to meet people with similar migrantexperiences or share mutual concerns. The homogeneity of participants, in terms of theirnationality and migrant-background, has facilitated the understanding and bettercommunication amongst users. In this sense, the members‘ identities are thus significantand affect their online interactions and in this online community, as the message posted240