Degree Year
2018
Document Type
Thesis - Open Access
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Anthropology
Advisor(s)
Erika Hoffman-Dilloway
Baron L. Pineda
Keywords
Heritage speaker, Language ideologies, Morocco, Identity, Transnationalism, Translanguage, Digital discourse, Authenticity, YouTube
Abstract
With the advent of user-generated social media, people are able to assert their ideas, opinions and positionality through online multi-way communication and participation. One such website is YouTube, a video platform where language production and identity negotiation are common. This thesis looks at a series of videos published on YouTube, entitled the "Moroccan Tag" to examine the ways five second-generation French-Moroccan YouTubers assert their national identities online. Using methods of guerrilla ethnography, I glean discourse from video content and comments to outline three key scaler processes through which identity performance manifests: through semiotic ideologies surrounding authenticity, language and imagined community. Together, my observations add to continuing conversations on diasporic identity, translanguaging and digital discourse.
Repository Citation
Lahlou, Radia Lyna, ""Crooked" Language: Moroccan Heritage Identity and Belonging on YouTube" (2018). Honors Papers. 164.
https://digitalcommons.oberlin.edu/honors/164
