There has been some research done on online parenting communities, with some discussion of participant demographics (but none that I know of specifically on how women of different races, classes, ethnic backgrounds connect): Drentea, P. and Moren-Cross, J.L. (2005) 'Social support and social capital on the Web: the case of an Internet mother site', Sociology of Health & Illness, 27(7), pp. 920-943. Madge, C. and O'Connor, H. (2006) 'Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?' Social & Cultural Geography, 7(2). Madge and O'Connor have written several more articles about online parenting communities from a UK perspective (check google scholar). ____________________________________ Dr Karen Farquharson Senior Lecturer in Sociology Academic Leader, Social and Policy Studies Co-Editor, International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Society http://www.swin.edu.au/ijets Faculty of Life and Social Sciences Swinburne University of Technology 1 John St. Hawthorn, VIC 3122 Australia ph: +61-(0)3-9214-5889 email: kfarquharson@swin.edu.au
danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> 22/02/2009 1:59 am >>> A friend of mine is trying to find research on women who are part of "birth week" groups. I've heard a lot about these forming through Craigslist, but I don't know who is doing research in this space. Does anyone here know? I've included his full query below. --danah
Begin forwarded message:
From: Ethan Zuckerman <ethanz@gmail.com>
In the past few (several?) years, online support groups have emerged for women who share a pregnancy due date. Some of these clubs are regional; others are nationwide or worldwide, usually constrained by language. Women participate because it's helpful to compare their experiences to women at the same stage of gestational development.
What's interesting to me about these groups is that they encourage connect - sometimes deep emotional connection - between women who don't share much in common in demograhic/psychograhic terms. These groups are limited by gender, age and basic computer literacy, but they appear to be - if only from anecdotes - more diverse than many voluntary online associations.
I'm interested in whether anyone has done either a detailed ethnographic or a quantitative, survey-based study of one or more of these communities. I'm especially interested in observations on support relationships developing between women who differ in terms of income, race and religion.
-E
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