hile earlier work has traced the genealogy of the diaspora concept from its earliest theoretical formulations to contemporary intellectual debates (Aizencang-Kane, 2022), the present article shifts the focus toward its specifically digital iteration. It investigates how platformized environments reconfigure rather than merely facilitate transnational ties, expanding beyond the conceptual foundations established in previous studies to address the unique challenges of the digital age. In the present article, I examine a new conceptual dimension shaped by contemporary experience. The objective is to explore the influence of mass media in general, and particularly the emergence of the Internet and social networks on the formation and articulation of what may be termed digital diasporas. Classical diasporas have long incorporated new technologies, enabling migrants to recreate practices and deepen relationships across distance. At the same time, diasporic formations shaped by transnational migration have increasingly emerged through these technological resources, in some cases inspiring the development of an extended civil society. Human displacement and the intensity of migratory flows have characterized recent decades, reinforcing and universalizing diasporic existence. According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division’s International Migrant Stock database, an estimated 304 million international migrants were recorded worldwide at mid-2024. These migrants defined as residents of a country who were born abroad, represent approximately 3.7% of the global population (United Nations, 2025). The contemporary world is marked by continuous mobility on an unprecedented scale. The circulation of people, resources, and information unfolds through multiple interconnected channels, increasing the frequency, volume, and multidirectionality of migration. As a result, displacement has become not only more common but also more complex, shaped by diverse routes, motivations, and forms of mobility. The mobility of large numbers of individuals across borders has led to the formation of diasporas or transnational communities (Faist, 2000). Many of these communities maintain strong relationships with their countries of origin. These ties generate economic, social, political, and cultural effects, and also influence subsequent migratory flows (Knott & McLoughlin, 2010). Classical approaches defined diasporas primarily in terms of dispersion and uprootedness. The concept derives from the Greek term *diaspeirein* (*dia*—across; *speirein*—to sow or scatter seeds), and was originally used to describe displaced communities and groups dislocated from their countries of origin through migration or exile (Braziel & Mannur, 2003). Over time, the concept expanded to encompass a variety of dispersed formations, including groups who conceive of themselves as a “people” or “nation” despite dispersion (Safran, 1991); segments of a people living outside the homeland (Connor, 1986); population once homogeneous but now dispersed (Sheffer, 2003); and globally dispersed individuals sharing a common origin (Ben-Rafael, 2013). Until the 1930s, social formations identified as diasporas consisted of communities sometimes sedentary, sometimes mobile dispersed from their countries of origin, often as a result of involuntary displacement. Many of these communities resisted assimilation, while others were denied the possibility of assimilating and often lived under harsh and precarious conditions. In an era dominated by the nation-state, diasporicity frequently implied second-class citizenship (Tololyan, 2012). While the Jewish diaspora occupied a central place in classical literature, from the 1960s onward the concept expanded to include other dispersed populations such as the Armenian, Greek, African, and Irish diasporas. By the 1980s, the term had been further extended to encompass expatriates, displaced persons, and ethnic and racial minorities, while labor and commercial migrations were also incorporated into the emerging typologies of diaspora. Over time, the term came to be debated within the broader framework of globalization and transnationalism, where identities were increasingly understood as mobile and in constant transformation (Clifford, 1994; Dufoix, 2008; Koser Akcapar & Bayraktar Akser, 2017). Brubaker synthesized earlier typologies (Cohen, 1997; Safran, 1991; Tololyan, 1991) and identified three central elements of diasporic formations: spatial dispersion; orientation toward a real or imagined homeland; and the maintenance of boundaries or group preservation (Brubaker, 2005). Today, communication technologies facilitate all three elements. Boundary maintenance alone presupposes a distinctive identity, active solidarity, and dense social relations that cross national borders and connect members of the diaspora—conditions that would be difficult to sustain without the technological media currently available to migrants. In more recent definitions, orientation toward the homeland has been reframed as cross-border experiences or as trilateral relationships between the group, the homeland, and the country of residence (Brubaker, 2005; Cohen, 1997; Faist, 2010; Safran, 2005; Sheffer, 2003). New uses of the term have shifted the emphasis from return to the homeland toward the maintenance of dense and continuous ties—ties that would be difficult to sustain without contemporary communication technologies. In many cases, the earlier focus on anticipated return has been replaced by circular exchange or transnational mobility. The notion of return has thus gradually given way to that of circulation (Bokser Liwerant, 2014). Even when diasporas sustain a rhetoric of return to the abandoned (and sometimes idealized) homeland, this rhetoric rarely results in permanent repatriation. Instead, it generates networks of economic, kinship, political, and cultural relationships linking dispersed communities with one another and with the homeland. The collective memory of the place of origin and the desire to return often take imaginative, affective, and material forms, including travel, remittances, cultural exchanges, lobbying, and commercial relations. Such practices generate varying degrees of institutionalization. Historical diasporas have gradually lost prominence, while new groups have formed diasporic spaces characterized by strong collective identification and diverse cross-border practices (Quayson & Daswani, 2013). The rapid development of digital technologies has transformed the ways in which connections are maintained with cultures of origin, diasporic networks, and co-nationals abroad. It has also reshaped relationships with those who remain in the homeland yet are nonetheless part of the transnational social space produced by migration (Brah, 2011; Levitt & Glick Schiller, 2008; Pries, 2001, 2008). In summary, migration amid globalization and transnational life has generated multiple forms of diasporic organization. These formations are characterized above all by sustained transnational relations and practices. The dispersed diasporas of the past have become the transnational communities of today, supported by diverse modes of social organization, mobility, and communication (Vertovec, 1999, 2009). Furthermore, diasporas should not be understood as discrete or clearly bounded entities. Rather, they are formations composed of convergences of people, ideas, and cultural orientations that may be contradictory and fragmented (Quayson & Daswani, 2013). In this context, diversity and fragmentation are defining characteristics of contemporary diasporas. While classical and transnational formations have significantly expanded the analytical scope of diaspora studies, they have not systematically addressed how digitally mediated interaction reshapes immediacy, proximity, and the everyday enactment of belonging across dispersed communities. This article contributes theoretically to diaspora studies by conceptualizing digital diasporas as a new dimension of transnational social space shaped by mediated immediacy and digital co-presence. Rather than replacing classical or transnational approaches, the concept of digital diaspora highlights how communication technologies intensify, reconfigure, and render more visible the relational, affective, and civic practices through which diasporic belonging and citizenship are enacted. This shift suggests that digital platforms do not merely ’augment’ pre-existing ties but fundamentally reconfigure the ontology of the diasporic group by enabling new forms of mediated immediacy and digital co-presence. # The Digital Space as a New Sphere of Interaction: The Formation of Digital Diasporas Some of the most innovative concepts within diaspora studies in recent years have already anticipated or incorporated digital interactions as defining features of the contemporary era. This assumption is embedded, for example, in definitions of diasporas as hybrid and heterogeneous formations (Werbner, 1997); as intangible and virtual space between a center and a dispersed periphery (Clifford, 2011); as networks that enable global dynamics of proximity and interaction (Vertovec & Cohen, 1999); and as decentered, partially overlapping systems of communication, movement, exchange, and kinship that connect transnational communities (Bokser Liwerant, 2014). Recent advances in communication technologies have led to a proliferation of new definitions of diaspora. The concept of digital diaspora does not appear in opposition to traditional diasporas, nor as their replacement. Rather, it represents an expansion and transformation of people’s agency in the digital age (Nedelcu, 2018). Ponzanesi, for example, uses the term to refer to virtual formations and digital diasporic networks. This definition does not imply that the traditional notion of diaspora has been superseded. Instead, it emphasizes how digital formations facilitate and transform the possibilities of diasporic affiliation. In this sense, she conceptualizes an ecosystem of media in which online and offline activities are interwoven and accounted for in different ways (Ponzanesi, 2020). Similarly, Andoni and Oiarzabal define digital diasporas as the various online networks migrants use to recreate identities, share opportunities, disseminate culture, influence policies in both the homeland and host society, and generate debates on issues of common interest through electronic devices (Andoni & Oiarzabal, 2010). The term digital diaspora is far from unambiguous and does not refer to a single, fixed meaning. Candidatu and Ponzanesi (2022) approach it as a ‘traveling concept,’ one that evolves over time and engages with different disciplinary perspectives and discursive reorientations. Anchored in the shift from migration studies’ focus on physical displacement to media studies’ emphasis on digital traces, this conceptual flexibility allows for a more nuanced analysis of varied online formations. The notions of “digital diasporas” and “online diasporas” (Bernal, 2014; Brinkerhoff, 2009; Ponzanesi, 2020) have primarily been examined within migration and international relations studies through discourse analysis. Scholars often focus on blogs and websites to explore how communities remain connected in virtual environments. By contrast, terms such as “e-diasporas,” “net diasporas,” and “web diasporas” are more commonly employed in technology and communication studies. These approaches focus more specifically on Internet interactions, with particular attention to hyperlinks and digital traces (Fernández-Tapia, 2021). Conceptualizing digital diaspora as a new dimension allows us to observe how migrants create “communities of belonging.” These communities enable them not only to reaffirm connections with their countries of origin but also to establish new relationships in host societies and among other ethnic diasporas. This dimension is facilitated by major social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, as well as more specialized applications including WhatsApp, WeChat, and FaceTime. These platforms reconfigure not only how online formations are created and organized but also how experiences of belonging are transmitted both effectively and affectively through new forms of immediacy and proximity (Ponzanesi, 2020). From a methodological perspective, in-depth and long-term ethnographies illuminate how diasporic spaces are created and sustained on social media. Digital and multi-sited ethnographic approaches capture the simultaneity of online and offline practices, tracing how everyday interactions, affective exchanges, and identity negotiations unfold across physical and digital locations. Such methods are particularly valuable for analyzing forms of digital co-presence that cannot be reduced to either virtual abstraction or territorial locality. This multi-sited approach also requires a critical reflection on the ethical and access challenges inherent in digital fieldwork, particularly when navigating private or encrypted messaging groups such as WhatsApp or WeChat, where the boundaries between public participation and private care are often blurred. Contemporary discussions of diaspora increasingly encompass diverse categories of international mobility across different social strata and geographic origins. These include expatriates, exiles, political refugees, forced and voluntary migrants, ethnic and racial minorities, as well as labor or commercial migrants. To these forms of transnational engagement can be added digitally connected forms of mobility. Hybrid or online forms of work, which expanded significantly after the COVID-19 pandemic, have facilitated the emergence of new forms of migration often described as “digital nomads,” “connected users,” or “connected migrants” (Fernández-Tapia, 2021). The figure of the connected migrant refers to a migrant equipped with at least one device that enables navigation within a digital environment. Such migrants are characterized by constant accessibility or, in Nedelcu’s terms, by “everyday co-presence” (Nedelcu, 2012; Nedelcu, 2016). However, it is important to distinguish these often privileged and voluntary forms of mobility from the classical ’uprootedness’ and trauma central to diaspora theory, questioning the extent to which nomadic identities replicate or diverge from collective memories of exile. Rather than constituting entirely separate forms of transnational engagement, digitally enabled mobility and digitally mediated diasporic life often overlap. Many migrants whose displacement predates the widespread diffusion of digital technologies have integrated these tools into their everyday practices, thereby transforming pre-existing diasporic formations. At the same time, newer forms of mobility increasingly emerge within environments already structured by digital infrastructures. In practice, the boundaries between these configurations are fluid, as migrants participate simultaneously in territorially grounded communities and digitally mediated networks that sustain social, economic, and cultural ties across borders. It is important to recognize that participation in digital diasporas is shaped by structural inequalities. Access to digital infrastructures remains uneven across regions, socioeconomic strata, and generations. Moreover, platform governance and algorithmic visibility further influence who becomes visible and who remains marginal within digital diasporic spaces. Recognizing these constraints is essential for understanding that digital diasporas are not universally accessible or equally empowering formations, but are embedded within broader configurations of technological and social power (Georgiou, 2023). In this sense, digital diasporas can be understood as formations characterized by the convergence of geographically dispersed individuals who have the capabilities and digital resources to remain virtually connected. These digitally mediated communities generate new forms of identity, belonging, activism, and empowerment, transforming the ways in which social connections are established and sustained. # The “Migrant Digital Space” and Place-Making Practices Studies on digital diasporas have created a distinct field of inquiry, offering new perspectives on migration and migrants’ practices. Research on migrants’ interactions with information and communication technologies (ICTs) has attracted growing attention across migration studies, anthropology, media studies, and science and technology studies (Sandberg et al., 2022). Scholars broadly agree that digital and technological media shape multiple phases of the migratory process by providing new ways to access, share, and preserve relevant information (Diminescu, 2008). Increasing attention to the entanglement of media and migration has shown how the technical affordances of digital platforms shape the transnationally connected yet locally situated social worlds in which migrants conduct their everyday lives (Ponzanesi & Leurs, 2022). These media also facilitate processes of social integration by transforming migrants’ forms of solidarity and enabling the accumulation of social and emotional capital (Sandberg et al., 2022). The interdependence between migrants’ everyday practices and the digital space has generated growing interest in place-making. Drawing on the notion of place as something created through lived experiences (Massey, 2005), digital places are understood as emerging from everyday interactions and routines. Such practices include group chats, video calls, microblogs, emails, gaming, online shopping, and music consumption, as well as posting and commenting on social media platforms (Sandberg et al., 2022). Through these activities, migrants not only communicate but also actively construct meaningful social spaces. Several scholars have adopted a relational approach to space, emphasizing processes of reterritorialization and place-making. Costa and Wang (2019), for example, argue that contemporary mobility enables individuals to inhabit multiple places simultaneously, as migrants engage in activities that contribute to the ongoing creation of these spaces. These spatial formations vary according to the actors who produce them, the scale at which they operate, and the challenges they entail (Costa & Wang, 2019). Building on relational spatial theory inspired by Lefebvre (1991), Massey (2005), and Harvey (2006), Sandberg and colleagues conceptualize the “migrant digital space” (MDS) as the outcome of social relations and practices with both material and intangible characteristics. The MDS refers to an online and offline domain in which information, communication, support, and representation are enacted through contemporary digital technologies. It consists of (a) digital actors (such as accounts, pages, hashtags, and channels), (b) migration-related themes (including migration routes, language learning, employment information, and legal advice) and (c) digital platforms that structure interaction. In both form and function, the digital space shares characteristics with other public spaces, including diversity, heterogeneity, and the coexistence of competing dynamics (Sandberg et al., 2022). Because these spaces emerge from different actors, themes, and platforms, and remain connected to material contexts, they cannot be understood as a single unified domain. Rather, “migrant digital spaces” should be conceived as multiple, partially overlapping spaces that combine differently across geographic contexts. Moreover, given the diversity of actors and interests involved, these spaces are inherently unstable and continuously reconfigured. The proliferation of minor and informal actors—who use social media to provide information and services—further contributes to this dynamism. Digital technologies also reshape the communicative hierarchies typical of traditional mass media. The linearity and capital-intensive nature of older mass media give way to more decentralized and comparatively accessible forms of interaction (Adeniyi, 2016). For migrants in particular, online communication offers anonymity, informality, and immediacy. It fills gaps left by offline environments and may provide a renewed sense of control over their lives and social relationships (Brinkerhoff, 2009). Social media platforms play a central role in place-making practices. While newspapers, television, radio, and early Internet forums contributed to the formation of transnational communities, social media, particularly Facebook in its early stages enabled new forms of connectivity, making possible new types of mediated belonging (Costa & Wang, 2019). Facebook’s architecture can generate a sensation of shared presence, as users interact within a common digital environment. In this sense, engaging on social media constitutes a form of spatial co-presence that helps build and sustain relationships, thereby providing a sense of togetherness (Pink et al., 2015). Nevertheless, following Granovetter’s distinction, many of these connections take the form of weak ties rather than strong, intimate bonds (Granovetter, 1983). Earlier migration research relied on aggregated data on migrant networks without distinguishing between close and extended ties abroad. Liu (2013), however, demonstrated that weak ties can play a central role in migration decision-making. Other studies suggest that the combination of close and extensive networks abroad can strongly enhance migration intentions, sometimes more than economic indicators such as income or employment (Manchin & Orazbayev, 2018). These networks operate through various mechanisms, including information exchange, financial assistance, and job-search support. Some estimates attribute a significant share of migration flows to diaspora-related network effects. The online world increasingly functions as an alternative living space. In digital environments, individuals interact within clearly delineated spheres, creating new forms of sociability. Social networks, like physical places, constitute constellations of encounters and experiences (Hinkson, 2017). Rather than functioning merely as media connecting two offline locations, social networks become places in their own right spaces where people live, maintain relationships, and engage in shared experiences. Through online place-making practices, migrants construct spaces of belonging that may resemble idealized homes or homelands. As Costa and Wang (2019) suggest, these networks allow migrants to feel at home within a “floating life,” compensating for experiences of displacement and uncertainty in offline contexts. # Social Networks, Forms of Capital, and the Expansion of the Political Space Information and communication technologies (ICTs) play a central role in enabling long-distance communication, maintaining relationships and providing access to nostalgic goods both material and symbolic while reducing feelings of estrangement. Beyond facilitating everyday sociability and forms of digital place-making, these technologies also reshape the networks through which migrants mobilize resources, construct identities, and participate in social and political life. As Solé and Parella (2006) observe, ICTs constitute a way of understanding and constructing new social relationships generating communicative, symbolic, and cultural flows in real time, and enabling family, social, and civic spaces to remain continuously connected. As a result, identities (whether weak or strong), social and civic practices, and transnational lifestyles are reproduced and transformed. The networks articulated through ICTs extend beyond cultural or symbolic ties and increasingly encompass economic, community, and political relationships. When such networks cross national boundaries in order to obtain, construct, or exercise rights, duties, and civic commitments, they give rise to what Solé and Parella define as transnational digital citizenship (Solé & Parella, 2006). Fernández-Tapia introduces the concept of *b-networks* (hybrid digital–face-to-face networks) to describe the combination of in-person interaction with ICT-mediated engagement. These hybrid networks connect cities and countries of destination with localities and countries of origin, as well as with third countries and global arenas. Through this dialectical relationship between physical places and digital spaces, migrants construct networks that operate simultaneously across multiple scales (Fernández-Tapia, 2021). Such networks—whether direct, digital, or hybrid—constitute forms of social, political, and symbolic capital that increasingly take digital form. By combining spaces of flows with spaces of places, migrants structure transnational social fields that include cyberspace. In doing so, these networks expand migrants’ capacities and opportunities across their countries of residence and origin, as well as within digital communities, opening new possibilities for civic participation and collective action. From this perspective, it becomes possible to speak not only of digital transnationalism but also of digital transnational citizenship. This notion refers to civic practices enacted within digitally mediated transnational spaces in which networked interactions articulate social, cultural, and symbolic capital. Within these configurations of digital relations, rights, duties, and civic commitments are constructed and exercised across borders. These processes involve the activation of community-based political and cultural networks, the reconfiguration of collective identities, and the articulation of spaces of places and spaces of flows through hybrid *b-networks* that structure transnational fields with their own social practices. As Fernández-Tapia notes, blogs and diaspora-based Facebook pages create reterritorialized spaces that encompass dispersed communities and illustrate “how citizenship inhabits the Internet,” treating it both as a space and as a new territory (Fernández-Tapia, 2021). Digital space thus serves as an alternative arena for accessing information, participating in the public sphere, and engaging in political life. It enables deliberation, organization, civil association, and economic and cultural exchange, while also providing platforms for protest and transnational activism. Online mobilization frequently generates effects that extend beyond the digital sphere. Studies of diasporic activism—from Eritrean digital publics to Ukrainian and Middle Eastern diaspora mobilizations—demonstrate how online platforms are used to coordinate fundraising, advocacy, and political engagement across borders, transforming digital capital into concrete civic and political action (Bernal, 2014; Brinkerhoff, 2009). As Brinkerhoff (2009) argues, digital diasporas can become powerful vehicles for advocacy and homeland engagement. The speed and flexibility of digital communication accelerate the circulation of ideas and facilitate agenda-setting across transnational networks. A growing body of empirical research illustrates how digital diasporas function as relational and political spaces. Research on the Eritrean diaspora shows how online forums and digital media constitute transnational public spheres for political debate and mobilization (Bernal, 2014). Studies of Filipino migrant families document how everyday digital communication enables mediated co-presence that sustains affective and caregiving ties across borders (Madianou & Miller, 2012). Analyses of Turkish diaspora mobilization around homeland politics (Koser Akcapar & Bayraktar Akser, 2017), Indian transnational professional and entrepreneurial networks linking global innovation hubs (Leclerc & Meyer, 2007), Israeli global civic and diasporic political networks (Aizencang-Kane 2022; Sheffer, 2003), and Ukrainian diaspora digital advocacy and fundraising during wartime (Onuch & Hale, 2022) likewise demonstrate how digital platforms facilitate political engagement, economic circulation, and collective solidarity beyond territorial boundaries. Together, these studies demonstrate that digital diasporas operate not merely as communicative networks but as lived transnational social fields in which belonging, solidarity, and citizenship are continuously enacted and negotiated. Nevertheless, the potential empowering of digital diasporas should not be overstated. The capacity to leverage ICTs varies significantly across socioeconomic status, digital literacy, legal position, and access to digital infrastructure. As a result, the accumulation of digital capital is unevenly distributed, and digital transnational citizenship emerges within asymmetrical structures of technological access and power. This complex geography of online–offline flows remains embedded within conventional state structures. Diasporas continue to operate within social fields marked by tensions between national frameworks and transnational practices (Smets et al., 2019). Digital expansion does not eliminate these tensions; rather, it reconfigures them within new communicative and political spaces. These dynamics illustrate how digital infrastructures not only sustain transnational connections but also reshape the social, political, and affective conditions through which diasporic belonging is experienced and enacted. # New Directions in Digital Diaspora Studies In recent years, scholarship on diasporas and transnationalism has increasingly foregrounded the role of digital platforms, affects, and mediated co-presence in shaping contemporary diasporic life. While earlier studies emphasized the Internet and social media primarily as tools that enable communication across distance, more recent contributions examine how platformization—that is, the growing influence of digital platforms and their economic, algorithmic, and governance logics—actively structures diasporic interactions, identities, and forms of belonging (Ponzanesi, 2020). Within this perspective, digital diasporas operate inside platform ecologies that are neither neutral nor egalitarian. Instead, they are shaped by commercial logics, content moderation regimes, and unequal power relations that influence who becomes visible, who is heard, and who is marginalized in digital space (Gillespie, 2021). Although Gillespie did not develop his framework specifically for diaspora studies, his analysis of platform governance offers a useful perspective for examining digitally mediated diasporic interactions. Building on this perspective, digital diasporic citizenship can be understood as a form of civic participation exercised within privately governed digital environments. While social media platforms enable diasporic communities to articulate identities, mobilize politically, and sustain transnational ties, algorithmic infrastructures and moderation systems quietly shape the conditions under which such participation becomes visible, legitimate, or marginal. For migrants and diasporic populations whose expressions often involve linguistic diversity, emotional narratives, and politically sensitive transnational issues these governance mechanisms can introduce uneven constraints on voice and recognition. Digital diasporic citizenship, therefore, unfolds not within a neutral public sphere but within a platformized environment in which civic agency is continually negotiated under opaque and non-democratic forms of regulation. This shift expands the analytical focus beyond connectivity alone toward the political, infrastructural, and symbolic conditions under which digital diasporic spaces are produced and sustained. Applied to diasporic contexts, platformization implies that online diasporic life is algorithmically shaped (which content circulates, what goes viral, what disappears); economically filtered (visibility tied to engagement, monetization, and advertising), and politically governed (through moderation, censorship, and surveillance). As Gillespie (2018) shows, moderation systems quietly determine which voices are amplified or silenced an issue of particular relevance for migrant and diasporic communities. If digital diasporas have been described as spaces of belonging affective, political, and relational environments that enable new forms of citizenship then the concept of platformization helps explain why these spaces are often uneven, unstable, and contested, without undermining migrant agency. Platformization thus highlights how digital diasporic environments are shaped not only by migrants’ practices, but also by the technological and economic infrastructures through which those practices unfold. This platformized environment directly shapes the circulation of emotions, as algorithmic filtering determines which narratives of solidarity or loss achieve visibility, thereby structuring the emotional lifecycle of digital affective publics. Growing attention has also been directed toward the affective and emotional dimensions of digital diasporas. Recent studies conceptualize online diasporic formations as affective publics and emotional communities, in which feelings of intimacy, solidarity, nostalgia, and belonging circulate through everyday digital practices and mediated interactions (Witteborn, 2022; Smets et al., 2019). These approaches reinforce the understanding of digital diasporas not merely as communicative or informational networks but as lived social spaces in which identities, forms of citizenship, and political engagement are continuously negotiated (Isin & Ruppert, 2020; Nedelcu & Wyss, 2016). Nedelcu and Wyss (2016) argue that contemporary migration and diasporic life are increasingly shaped by digital co-presence, a condition that allows migrants to maintain continuous social, emotional, and civic engagement across borders through digital technologies. Unlike earlier forms of mediated communication, digital platforms enable a form of permanent connectivity that collapses distance and allows migrants to remain embedded in multiple social worlds: those of the host society, the country of origin, and transnational diasporic networks. A central contribution of their work is the reconceptualization of transnationalism as an everyday, routinized practice, rather than an exceptional or episodic one. Digital communication technologies such as messaging applications, social media platforms, and video calls allow migrants to participate in family life, community debates, political discussions, and civic practices in real time. This produces what the authors describe as “thick” transnational social fields sustained not only by mobility or return but also by constant digital interaction. In this context, transnational belonging becomes less dependent on physical presence and increasingly shaped by ongoing participation. These developments also reshape power, agency, and inequality within diasporic spaces. While digital connectivity enhances migrants’ capacity for coordination, support, and civic engagement, it also generates new forms of dependence on digital platforms and infrastructures that migrants do not control. Access to stable connectivity, digital literacy, language competence, and platform governance regimes all influence who can participate fully in these transnational environments. Digital transnationalism, therefore, emerges as both empowering and stratifying, producing uneven forms of inclusion and recognition within diasporic communities. Finally, these transformations have direct implications for digital diasporic citizenship. Civic participation, care practices, and political engagement increasingly occur through digitally mediated co-presence, blurring the boundaries between private life, community belonging, and public action. Citizenship, in this sense, is enacted not only through legal status or territorial residence, but also through everyday digital practices that sustain social ties, responsibilities, and claims across borders. Digital diasporas thus appear not merely as communicative networks, but as lived social and civic spaces continuously negotiated through everyday digital interaction These emerging perspectives highlight how digital diasporas must be understood not only as communicative networks but also as complex socio-technical environments shaped by platform infrastructures, affective dynamics, and everyday practices of mediated co-presence. Taken together, these developments suggest that contemporary diasporic life cannot be fully understood without considering the transformative role of digital technologies in reshaping belonging, interaction, and transnational engagement. The following reflections synthesize these insights and consider their broader implications for diaspora studies. # Final Reflections The notion of “online transnationalism” or “digital transnationalism,” introduced by Starikov et al. (2018) to describe emerging analytical perspectives within migration studies, invites reflection on how the intersections between digital media and transnational processes give rise to a qualitatively new phenomenon that has not yet been fully explored (Tedeschi et al., 2022). Within this broader framework, and with regard to diasporas—the focus of this reflection—digital media have expanded the possibilities of belonging to diasporic life. Digital technologies enable the creation and development of new diasporic forms with diverse implications and tangible effects on contemporary societies. Whereas classical authors emphasized dispersion and uprootedness, the concept of digital diaspora highlights the emergence of communities of belonging characterized by immediacy, connectivity, and ongoing interaction among co-nationals dispersed across different geographical locations. The widespread diffusion of the Internet and social media has facilitated the formation of virtual communities in which geographical barriers no longer prevent the exchange of ideas, practices, and resources. In this sense, digital diasporas constitute relational spaces where individuals gather, share experiences, and identify as members of a community. They can thus be understood as real constellations of encounters and shared experiences. Scholarship in diaspora and media studies has increasingly challenged earlier frameworks centered on the image of an abandoned or idealized homeland. Instead, contemporary approaches emphasize agency, mediated interaction, and the circulation of ideas, resources, and information across transnational networks. They also emphasized the importance of everyday practices in shaping and re-shaping social space. In the era of digital diasporas, some communities are strengthened, others weakened, but all are transformed (Fernández-Tapia, 2021). As discussed throughout this article, migrants’ everyday practices are deeply intertwined with digital environments. If place is shaped by lived experiences (Massey, 2005), digital environments likewise become meaningful spaces through routine interactions and social practices. Contemporary understandings of diasporic communication therefore contribute to a redefinition of the sense of place (Sandberg et al., 2022). These processes are also closely connected to affective and emotional dynamics. Diasporic spaces may function as emotional geographies, where migrants navigate cultural and psychological boundaries through ongoing communication and interaction (Noivo, 2002). Through such exchanges, relationships and networks generate affective bonds, group solidarity, and shared identities (Lawler, 2001). In this sense, diasporas can be understood as “emotional communities” (Rosenwein, 2006) that share values, goals, and collective identities (Smets et al., 2019). Digital diasporas, understood as affective and emotional communities, have therefore become an important area of development within media and migration studies (Witteborn, 2022; Georgiou, 2023). Digital technologies have thus enabled the (re)spatialization of diasporas that were once primarily described as deterritorialized formations. They generate new diasporic spaces characterized by complex geographies of flows and hybrid online–offline place-making. Within these spaces, the relationship between time, space, agency, and structure is reconfigured and renegotiated. A more sustained engagement with the role of algorithmic filtering and platform governance will be essential to understand how digital technologies do not only support but actively filter the diasporic experience, shaping which voices are heard and which remain marginal within the digital transnational social space. This article contributes theoretically to diaspora studies by conceptualizing digital diaspora as a new dimension of transnational social space shaped by mediated immediacy, digital co-presence, and platform-mediated interaction. Digital technologies do not simply extend pre-existing diasporic connections; they transform the ways in which belonging, identity, and citizenship are enacted across dispersed communities. At the same time, these digitally mediated spaces remain structured by inequalities in technological access, platform governance, and digital infrastructures that influence participation, visibility, and voice. Understanding digital diasporas, therefore, requires moving beyond the idea of technology as a simple tool of communication and recognizing digital infrastructures as constitutive elements of contemporary transnational life. By conceptualizing digital diaspora as a reconfiguration of diasporic social space, this article contributes to ongoing debates on migration, media, and belonging in an increasingly interconnected world. Future empirical research will be essential to examine how these dynamics unfold across different diasporic contexts. Multi-sited ethnography, digital ethnography, platform analysis, and comparative case studies could help illuminate how digital co-presence, affective belonging, and digital citizenship are experienced in everyday life. Such approaches would also enable exploration of how power, inequality, and agency shape the diverse configurations of digital diasporic life.

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