Collected Item: “HIST30060 Group-chat shenanigans”
Give your story a title.
HIST30060 Group-chat shenanigans
What sort of object is this: text story, photograph, video, audio interview, screenshot, drawing, meme, etc.?
Screenshot
Tell us a story; share your experience. Describe what the object or story you've uploaded says about the pandemic, and/or why what you've submitted is important to you.
Lockdown shifted the nature of community dynamics in our local area. We live in a peri-urban region on the outskirts of the Yarra Ranges; as such, neighbouring properties are separated by large swathes of Australian bush. This can be isolating at times; it’s very different to suburban living. Our street (which spans about 7kms) and adjacent streets have a WhatsApp group chat named ‘Fireguard’, which allows residents to share information about fire safety, planned burn-offs and emergency warnings. However, during lockdown the chat was increasingly used for the purposes of socialisation. Suddenly, distant neighbours began sharing jokes and engaging in conversations about lockdown living, through the chat. The chat became a site of social interaction that the members of our area probably didn’t realise they needed, until they did. We eventually decided to create a separate chat for general/social purposes only, the title ‘WHICHBIN’ constituting a friendly inside joke about one particular chat member who never fails to ask, “which bin?” she needs to put out for collection each week.
Use one-word hashtags (separated by commas) to describe your story. For example: Where did it originate? How does this object make you feel? How does this object relate to the pandemic?
Lockdown, community, social media
Who originally created this object? (If you created this object, such as photo, then put "self" here.)
Olivia Tregambe
Give this story a date.
2021-09-10