The present Information Age is governed by a new kind of digital communication network which has spread like a system of veins and capillaries throughout our social fabric. ‘Social media’ is the most appropriate term used to describe this ever expanding umbrella under which we witness the mushrooming of techno-social interactions. In the present decade, more so with the advent of a new world order post COVID-19, communication, collaboration and transmission of ideas through the social media platform has become a compulsive necessity for those involved in qualitative social research. Inter-linked or interdependent online communities are increasingly becoming the focus of ethnography. The field of Ethnography has rightly shifted its focus to the online world which is where we now share and experience the cultural phenomena. A social media ethnographer spends a substantial part of his day on the internet keeping one abreast with discussions and participating in online events. Malinowski’s ethnographer is still involved in participant observation but today it is a different kind of a virtual experience and the New Ethnographic field is no more a distant exotic locale but a virtual field. Defining the boundaries of the ethnographic field was always a Herculean task. But the boundaries of the new ethnographic field have to be continuously watched, noted and revised as they are not based on static geometric dimensions, topography or national barriers but are a result of discussions, participants’ interests, likes, networking, sharing, etc. Apart from discussing social media as a new ethnographic field, this paper also explores the changed role of an Ethnographer in the context of the new field where one needs to be more responsive and alert to the fluidity and expansiveness of the medium and should have the aptitude to filter out the relevant data from the sea of information.
