Abstract
This study investigates the complex relationship between the physical and digital spaces of the city of Douala, Cameroon by comparing its online representation with the social representations emerging orally by locals. Using the results of two existing studies reporting on the online image of the city, we investigate the social representations foreigners and locally relevant people have of Douala and uncover similarities and discrepancies of the two resulting representations. Outcomes from the analysis permit reflection on the implications of these and show an unripe, intermediate stage of the “hybrid Douala,” where the virtual space seems still not to be affecting the way the physical space is experienced, as well as where the gaps in the digital divide are perpetuated. At the same time, strong local ownership of certain digital activities suggests how the online image of the city is in the process of being constructed and developed locally. As the spaces of the city start appearing online, the process of hybridization between physical and digital Douala is slowly taking place and offline and online narratives, now rather separated, will possibly communicate a different image of the city to global online narratives.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Les frontières du discours
- Les frontières du discours : Catégories d’analyse, unités et procédés
- Unités linguistiques et formes textuelles
- Les opérations de liages micro-textuels : Un premier palier de délimitation des unités textuelles
- Le discontinu des catégories linguistiques confronté aux catégories et concepts des analyses du discours et au continu du déroulement de la parole « située »
- Texte, discours, cognition
- Conception du corpus et méthodologie d’analyse : Pour un renouvellement de l’analyse des discours institutionnels et politiques
- La définition : construction d’une catégorie (linguistique ? discursive ?) dans différents espaces de discours
- Le texte/discours entre lieu d’observation et objet d’analyse : Eclairages sémantiques par le processus d’écriture
- Approche procédurale de la lecture : Catégories flottantes et unités élastiques
- Syntaxe et discursivité : Le cas de la dislocation gauche
- Social representations, ICTs, and community empowerment
- Editorial
- What power? Social representations of ICTs’ appropriation for community empowerment in Latin American social movements
- Public access venues and community empowerment in Mozambique: a social representation study
- Douala as a “hybrid space”: Comparing online and offline representations of a sub-Saharan city
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Les frontières du discours
- Les frontières du discours : Catégories d’analyse, unités et procédés
- Unités linguistiques et formes textuelles
- Les opérations de liages micro-textuels : Un premier palier de délimitation des unités textuelles
- Le discontinu des catégories linguistiques confronté aux catégories et concepts des analyses du discours et au continu du déroulement de la parole « située »
- Texte, discours, cognition
- Conception du corpus et méthodologie d’analyse : Pour un renouvellement de l’analyse des discours institutionnels et politiques
- La définition : construction d’une catégorie (linguistique ? discursive ?) dans différents espaces de discours
- Le texte/discours entre lieu d’observation et objet d’analyse : Eclairages sémantiques par le processus d’écriture
- Approche procédurale de la lecture : Catégories flottantes et unités élastiques
- Syntaxe et discursivité : Le cas de la dislocation gauche
- Social representations, ICTs, and community empowerment
- Editorial
- What power? Social representations of ICTs’ appropriation for community empowerment in Latin American social movements
- Public access venues and community empowerment in Mozambique: a social representation study
- Douala as a “hybrid space”: Comparing online and offline representations of a sub-Saharan city