Online communities and their contribution to local heritage knowledge

Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the potential of social media as a framework for people-centered heritage. With a focus on the interpretation and display of heritage by online communities, this paper aims at providing insights into the social production of heritage – the social co-construction of meanings of everyday landscape and the making of the collective and local identity. Design/methodology/approach This paper proposes a methodological roadmap for the digital ethnography of everyday heritage. It reveals (1) the fundamental principles according to which people make value judgments and associate meanings to the urban landscape, and (2) the role of online communities in conveying collective identity and heritage values within the community realm. As a case study area for the implementation of the proposed method, three Facebook community group pages for Tripoli, Lebanon were chosen. The posts and comments were translated into English and uploaded to NVivo 12 plus and a deductive thematic approach to qualitative data analysis was applied. The data was coded into three main nodes: the actors, the tangible assets and the value registers. Findings Results show that Facebook users are concerned with environmental equality, common interests, utility, right to the city and representativeness, while the beautification of heritage is often perceived as a threat to these values. Originality/value This investigation goes beyond heritage attributes (what) and values (why) to examine how values are assigned by local communities. It provides a comprehensive understanding of value judgment and the rationale and arguments used to justify positions and mobilize online community members in order to contribute to the digital co-construction of everyday heritage.