Third International Conference on Communication & Media Studies

Abstract

This study highlights social media utilization by Filipino migrants in central Italy and underlines the effects controlling one’s image to their online networks has on their migrant livelihoods. Ethnographic research was done through participant observation, open-ended, semi-structured interviews,and focus group discussions of twenty-five Filipinos, namely in the areas of Rome, Siena, and the Rieti province. The project delineates both the extent of social media use and its importance in Filipino-Italian migrant livelihoods, utilizing Harvey and Myers’ critical hermeneutic framework, which recognizes the lack of neutrality in evaluating narrative data, as the basis of analysis. This work shows that Filipino migrant social media use goes beyond recreation and networking - it reaffirms a positive transnational imaginary. Different factors, including the degree of social media utilization, digital literacy, and affiliation to their Filipino culture, vary the degree such production and perpetuation of the imaginary takes place. Nevertheless, the findings suggest that upholding this imaginary attempts to curb Italian xenophobic tendencies towards foreigners, most notably by displaying similar or analogous cultural values and traditions. Such attempts of cultural production serve to recognize and accept these migrants in society by the host culture. The lens through which this phenomenon is examined additionally highlights social media as a coping mechanism for the separation from loved ones, difficult work experiences, and other factors faced by Filipino immigrants in Italy.