ASIAN ETHNICITY 13 only as a source of information and intra-ethnic communication for minority groups, but also as an instrument to preserve and promote ethnic languages and identity. Most of these non-Bamar ethnic media pages cover local news, which range from cultural and social gatherings to local crime and armed conflict. Almost all of these pages cover social and cultural activities such as ethnic new year celebrations, harvest festivals and national day celebrations. Not unexpectedly, the media pages of ethnic areas with intense conflict situations, such as Rakhine and Ta'ang pages, cover news about armed conflict between the Tatmadaw and ethnic armed organizations, and images of conflictaffected communities, such as casualties caused by land mines and crossfire. Most posts in Kachin news pages uploaded on Facebook in the first week of February 2020 were about local civil society groups promoting Kachin national aspirations and confronta­ tions with the local police and administrative departments. All respondents reported that they either followed or ‘liked’ other non-Bamar ethnic media pages as well as other mainstream local and international media such as Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), the 7Day private newspaper, British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), and Radio Free Asia (RFA). They mostly followed media pages of other ethnic groups, who live in areas of proximity or shared similar community grievances. A Kachin woman respondent in her 30s stated: ‘I also read other ethnic media pages, mostly Ta'ang (Palaung) and Shan pages. I intentionally follow some of them. I might have put “like” on their posts and see their posts pop up more frequently.’ Another Naga male respondent in his 30s said: ‘I used to read some news posted by Chin media . . . Recently, I have seen a lot of information posted by Rakhine media and by individuals.’ Pa-O, Danu, Ta'ang and Shan respondents also shared that they followed each other’s media or individual pages to get updates about other minority ethnic areas. Figure 1. Non-bamar ethnic media pages on Facebook and their language usages.