Virtual English: Queer Internets and Digital Creolization

This manuscript examines what I term “digital creolization,” the process where English is strategically deployed in electronic media in order to counter dominant understandings of sexuality, gender, sex, cyberspace, computer-mediated communication, ethnicity, race, nation, and community. Understanding non-standard English use in digital environments as digital creolization reveals unexpected responses to the forces of globalization and predominant U.S. value systems. The populations in my study-- speculative fiction writers, Thai women confronting gender stereotypes, Bangkok-based Thai gay men who use the internet for local activities, and Tamil Eelam supporters imagining a conventional nationstate through the use of digital tactics--contribute websites, conversations, and artifacts that broaden conventional understanding of sexualities, genders, and national membership.