Mediating culture in transnational spaces: An example of young people from refugee backgrounds

Many young people with refugee backgrounds struggle to develop positive social and cultural identities in their new settlement locations and often experience disadvantage and marginalization. Yet, recent developments in low cost, accessible Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) potentially provide new opportunities for them to seek their sources of identity and identification elsewhere – through family, peer and cultural connections that transcend the limitations of place. But do youth from refugee backgrounds take advantage of these opportunities for cultural renewal and reconstruction and, if they do, what are the consequences for their local and transnational identities and social networks? As more young people experience mobility – either forced or voluntary – in the course of their early lives, virtual interactions become an important domain of social and cultural practice. In this paper, I explore the mediating effects of digital communications for a small group of young people from refugee backgrounds who currently live in Melbourne but conduct their lives across the globe, in order to reflect on what these experiences suggest about a new set of possibilities for creating trans-local cultures.