Radicalism vs. Consistency: The Cyber Influence on Individuals’ Non-Routine Uses in Public Spaces, the case of Cairo

Abstract

Since the emergence of the concept of user-generated content websites—Web 2.0, Internet communications have developed as a powerful personal and social phenomenon. Many Internet applications have become partially or entirely related to the concept of social network; and cyberspace has become a space about ‘us’ not ‘where’ we are. This paper investigates the theoretical grounds of the effect of cyber experience on changing the individuals’ uses of the public spaces, and sustaining this change through maintaining the ties and reciprocal influence between actions in physical and cyber spaces. It aims at examining the impact of cyber territories on the perception, definition and effectiveness of personal space within different circumstances; and its role in changing the uses of spaces where people used to act habitually. The personal space, here, will be represented as the core of both: change and consistency—the space of bridging the reciprocal effect of cyber and physical counterparts, which is transformed through the experience of physical events mediated into the cyberspace. The paper is part of a study which looks at the case of Tahrir Square during the Egyptian political movement in 2011. We will compare the activists’ actions and practices in the Square during different events of non-routine use of the square and its surroundings. The case study will show the level of consistency in the features of the produced personal space within different waves of the revolutionary actions for all that different circumstances, motivations and results.