Negotiating Singaporean national identity through discussing foreigners on STOMP.

Abstract

Straits Times Online Mobile Print (STOMP) has garnered much attention from Singaporeans. As a citizen journalism website frequented by mostly Singaporeans, it presents slices of the citizens‟ public and private lives. When authors like Dennis (2008) and Mann (1998) argue the rise of self and social surveillance because of convergence technology, complementarily, discussion around user-contributed stories becomes virtual spaces of national identity negotiation, especially when the stories posted involve foreigners. Using a micro-sociological perspective, I attempt to discover the ways self-identified Singaporeans “perform” their national identity in discussions and user-generated stories on STOMP using qualitative content analysis and interviews - showing that citizen journalism has become a new platform for national identity construction online.