Charles Hays

Plaid Kilts and Black Leather Jackets: Social Imaginary and the Construction of Community Charles Hays

This study explores how community and cultural identities are formed in two online discussion groups on Usenet, rec.motorcycles.harley (RMH) and soc.culture.scottish (SCS). Using the method of depth hermeneutics, this study first considers how the cultural images of the biker or the Scot have been constructed in traditional media. This study finds that in each online group, participants create a "social imaginary" or community group. Rather than creating a community or culture that exists completely within a computer network, participants instead integrate their communities-of-interest into their daily lives and also suture their daily lives into the events and activities taking place on Usenet.