Date of Award
2007
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Communication and Culture
First Advisor
Catherine Middleton
Abstract
In this thesis, I set forth to examine and explore a blog's ability to build and foster a sense of community, to construct and maintain a collective identity within this community and its effectiveness as a method of communication. I launched a community blog for the Communication and Culture program, of which I am enrolled as an MA student, to address the following questions; 1) Do blogs encourage a sense of community? 2) Do blogs help to construct and maintain a collective identity within this community? 3) How is a blog more or less effective than previous online communication mediums?
Key findings include the blog's small-scale success in fostering a sense of community for the group of students that participated on the blog, and the ComCult community's need to focus on encouraging face-to-face interaction in order to foster a stronger sense of community and a stronger collective identity.
Recommended Citation
Gagatsis, Linda, "Building and fostering a sense of community : a case study of the ComCult weblog" (2007). Theses and dissertations. Paper 329.
http://digitalcommons.ryerson.ca/dissertations/329