Diaspora and Social Media use in Germany and Switzerland : a literature review

The following analysis was done as a part of an EU-funded research project SOMECAT. A literature analysis for German publications in Switzerland and Germany in the field of Social Media and Diaspora shows that there is few research focusing explicitly on social media. The following article summarizes the state-of-the-art German language literature on Internet-media and migration studies approximately over the last decade. This research area has been taken into account mostly as part of the broad (mass) media landscape. We start with introducing the current situation in the area of Internet and migration studies and then present research directions in the general field of migration and media studies. In our analysis we took into account German and Swiss studies. The overview distinguishes the research questions addressed in the literature, the theoretical framework and some selected empirical studies