Representation of Cultural Citizenship at Contact Zones: The Symbolic Exclusion of Vietnamese in Urban/Digital Space in Brno, Czech Republic.

Abstract

This study examines how an immigrant population is symbolically represented in both urban and digital spaces. The investigator, who is a newcomer in Brno, a city in the Czech Republic, reflexively interprets the symbolic meaning of spatial settings and information on the Internet. In this research, the investigator especially interprets visual and textual representations of the Vietnamese population at two main cultural contact zones (Appadurai, 1991) for a newcomer, the area near the main railway station in Brno and the Internet.
According to the 2011 census, more than 83,000 Vietnamese people, including citizens and residents, live in the Czech Republic. While there are no census data of Vietnamese who are Czech citizens in Brno, there are over 4,500 Vietnamese citizens who live permanently in Brno and its vicinity (Czech Statistical Office, 2011). Most businesses owned by Vietnamese Czechs in Brno are located around the main railway station, and there are a few Vietnamese restaurants in the city center. There are also some small shops in the underpass under the station and tiny outdoor shops forming a line of street vendors along the railway. These businesses specialize in selling cheap, imported fashion items, such as clothes and shoes. For visitors, this area is an entryway to Brno because the international bus terminal and a bus stop for passengers coming from the airport are also located near the station. At the same time, this area creates a border between the old city center, in which most historical heritage sites, cultural facilities, and public offices are located, and the south parts of the city, which are not popular tourist destinations. In other words, the area is a symbolic space forming a “margin” for the well-packaged city center. Because they are concentrated in this area and selling shoddy goods, Vietnamese small-business owners and workers deliver messages to visitors of symbolic exclusion from mainstream urban relations (Ong, 2006).
In a digital age, the Internet plays an important role as an information hub. Especially for those who are newly settled in a city where the official language is other than their native language or English, the Internet is one of only a few information sources. Despite language differences, various websites provide information and user-generated contents in multiple languages. In addition, recently well-developed online translation provided by major portal services, such as Google and Bing, have become useful tools for obtaining information encoded in Czech. Being interested in the sizable number of Vietnamese people in Brno, the investigator has tried to obtain information about this population on the Internet. However, a very limited number of Internet sources in English are available. Despite their relatively long history of migration to Czech Republic, Vietnamese Czechs are underrepresented in the digital space where many people learn about a place they visit.
In this study, the investigator first describes his interactions with spaces, images, and textual information in and about Brno. Based on ethnographic observation, he interprets their meanings and shows how the immigrants are symbolically excluded from the mainstream population. Finally, this study critically explores how both urban and digital spaces signify symbolic meanings of cultural citizenship in a neoliberal world.