Digital mourning on Facebook: the case of Filipino migrant worker live-in caregivers in Israel

Abstract

The practice of mourning on social media, known as digital mourning, has become a worldwide phenomenon. While scholarly attention focuses on manifestations of online grief, there is a dearth of research regarding this process among immigrants. Based on a digital ethnography on Facebook on the Filipino community in Israel, this study inquires how migrant workers construct their mourning on digital networks. Focusing on grief upon death in the host country, two different practices of digital mourning were found. When Filipino live-in caregivers announce the loss of their elderly employers, their personal pain is shared on their own Facebook wall, receiving personal condolence comments. However, when a fellow Filipino migrant worker passes away, the pain is shared in closed community groups on Facebook, which are followed by thousands of condolence comments. This practice creates a communal feeling that can be termed Communal Digital Grief, and differs from the Personal Digital Grief experienced by migrants as a result of the loss of their employer. This study sheds light on two different practices of digital mourning. One appears on the personal Facebook walls of the bereaved and has therapeutic impact, while the other appears on closed Facebook groups and contributes to community building.