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Re: THE NEW TRIBES OF CYBERSPACE:/... are you black?
wd&aeMiller (mclaren4@ozemail.com.au)
3 Sep 1996 06:00:34 GMT
What's in a name?
I am a student of anthropology of thirty-some years and very pleased to
find this site: an oasis among the rubbish I've encountered thus far in
cyberspace.
As a newcomer to the wondrous Net I have already communicated with
perhaps a hundred people and could not tell - and did not enquire - as
to their ethnic origins. Only by name (Wong, Steinbeck etc) can
intelligent people distinguish some person's birth-origins in print,
even in the ephemeral print found in cyberspace. But can we assume
everyone is truthful and uses a name that matches their colour, ethnic
or tribal group. On the Net, people don't yet introduce themselves as
Robert Williams - African American, or Rhonda Chow nee Petersen - I
married a Chinese person but my family are from Sweden.
Some, as I read today in this newsgroup, passionately declare their
colour or ethnic origins, they have already begun to construct a new
forum for tired racists regimes. I'd prefer not to read racist, or
closet racist articles in a newsgroup dealing with anthropology, please.
What say you? - Sincerely, Philip.
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