We invite submissions for a special issue of Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies on the
topic of Digital Placemaking. As digital and physical environments converge,
each increasingly producing the norms and parameters of the other, it is
important to consider how the drive to create and control a sense of place remains
primary to how social actors identify with each other and express their
identities, and how communities organize to build more meaningful, connected
spaces. Instead of depleting a sense of place, the ability to forge attachments
to digital media environments and through digital practices enables people to
emplace themselves and others. The increasing mobility of people, goods and
services, information, and capital contribute to the impression of a world in
flux where the “space of flows” dominates the “space of places,” while at the
more personal scale, multiplying public and private uses of digital media have
produced varied discourses on the potential for these practices to dissociate
or liberate users from co-present environments.
The implication of these perspectives is that our collective sense of
place has been disrupted, leaving people unsure of their belonging within
conditions and boundaries that seem increasingly fluid. While it is imperative
to attend to the shifting social, economic, and political conditions that give
rise to such concerns, it is also necessary to recognize the many ways people
actually use digital media to negotiate differential mobilities and become
placemakers.
