708.3 How do Cameroon women of diaspora build their professional identity on the web ? A study case

Saturday, August 4, 2012: 1:00 PM
Faculty of Economics, TBA
Oral Presentation
Carmen DIOP , Education, Université Paris 13 Villetaneuse - EXPERICE (Paris 8/Paris 13), Villetaneuse, France
What are the posture, statements and engagement of Francophone  Cameroon women of Diaspora in Web sites and social networks? They are involved in digital media in order to receive a reward in their community and from the institutions. This paper is based on a case study : a trained web journalist, a web self-educated facilitator and an online chief editor. The first in included in a traditional academic context and is a member of a structured media. The second has an "amateurish" and militant approach. The third holds editorial function without using the forms of communication of social networks. Novel and short stories published at the author, versus sociological research; professionalism versus experimentation; structural constraint versus freedom of expression, professional identity versus ethnic sexual identity, production of information versus militant messages, national perspective versus pan-African approach. And for the last one, a posture based on the generational traditional African family precedence that does not promote individuality. They are ambivalent between their desire of visibility and their posture as females. This paper draws on symbolic interactionism and leans on identity and professionalism in discursive production. The selves produce specific discourses on their practice, on their identity and on other actors. The assumption is that producing statements on the Web is a way to search success and recognition as “opinion leaders”.