Kulturmøder i cyberspace

Resumé

This article deals with cultural encounters in cyberspace from a theoretical as well as an empirical point of view. It is argued that cultural encounters can be seen as (i) relations of varying intensity, (ii) encounters between individuals situated in diverse structural contexts, (iii) communicative actions that are influenced by the complex media genres of modern society, and (iv) expressions of everyday life. Moreover, it is argued that the notion of cyberspace can be profitably defined as the semi-imaginative experience of place that people have when they take part in conversational communication on the Internet. Based on an analysis of a number of intercultural conversations that have taken place within the newsgroup dk.livssyn from 1 September 2000 to 1 March 2001, the article concludes that, in general, the cultural encounters within this online context seem to be fluctuating, dynamic, and highly individually constructed.