Culture, Power, and 'Facebook'

Throughout the course and from my group’s research, I have truly come to understand how much culture, power, and cyberspace are intertwined. Facebook has evolved into a social networking site that numerous people all over the world use. It has reached a global extent that seems to have limitless possibilities for communication. As a result, it brings such a variety of cultures together into one dimension. But as we see in the ‘actual’ world, the collision of cultures often brings about some sort of dynamic and complex struggle for power that often leaves groups of people marginalized. I think that those who manage Facebook are aware of this situation. A way of managing dynamic flows of power on Facebook among a large pool of people is to keep them separate. Our individualized social networks keep us separate from ‘others.’ Our social networks can act as borders; working as an effort to keep us away from ‘strangers’ or the ‘other’ we don’t identify with in order to avoid conflicts of power. It is interesting to see how the dynamics of power transform and work in subtle ways on social networking sites.