Remembering the Island : Informal Education of Puerto Ricans in the Diaspora through Digital Media

Sammanfattning

The study adopts a qualitative interpretive approach using semi-structured interviews with seven Puerto Rican diaspora participants residing in the United States, France, and South Korea. Interviews were conducted in English, Spanish, or Spanglish according to participant preference and analysed through reflexive thematic analysis following Braun and Clarke’s framework. The theoretical framework combines diaspora theory, Anderson’s concept of imagined communities, and social movement theory, particularly connective action, to examine how migration, mediated communication, and digital participation shape historical understanding and identity formation. The findings indicate that participants frequently described formal education as limited, fragmented, or insufficient in its treatment of Puerto Rican history, colonialism, and political status. Many participants reported that Puerto Rico was either absent from school curricula or reduced to superficial representations centred on tourism, colonisation, or cultural stereotypes. As a result, participants often relied upon informal learning practices through family narratives, music, digital media, and online communities to construct historical and political understanding. Digital media platforms emerged as particularly significant environments for incidental and intentional learning, allowing participants to encounter political discourse, historical reinterpretations, cultural expression, and collective memory across transnational networks. Music, especially artists such as Bad Bunny and Calle 13, social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, podcasts, and online discussions were frequently identified as important sources of political education and cultural connection. The study argues that digital media increasingly functions not simply as a communication technology but as a decentralised educational environment through which diaspora Puerto Ricans negotiate identity, reinterpret historical narratives, and maintain symbolic connections to the island. The findings contribute to broader discussions surrounding informal learning, colonial education, collective memory, and transnational digital cultures by demonstrating how historical consciousness is shaped across dispersed and participatory media environments rather than exclusively within formal institutions.