Charles Cheung, Identity Construction and Self-Presentation on Personal Homepages: emancipatory potentials and reality constrains, edited by Gauntlett, D& Horsley, R in Web Studies Chapter 4, London: Arnold, (2004), pp. 53-68, ISBN: 9780340814727
In the contemporary age of mass media especially in the age of web 2.0, the approaches to self-presentation have been tightly connected to the internet to some extent. As the emergence of personal homepages on the internet, this has been regarded as a newly-born and popular access to express individuals’ self-identities, or even reconstruct their identities. For that individuals could produce any content for whether expressing themselves or sharing their hobbies and experiences. However, there is an ambiguous function of the personal homepages on shaping individuals’ identity. Charles Cheung’s essay in 2004 about the identity construction and self-presentation on personal homepages is an appropriate example of showing the analysis of both the emancipatory potential and reality constrains of the personal homepage.
As the title indicates, this essay is mainly arguing about the relationship between the personal homepages on the internet and individuals’ self-identity construction. This argument is out-linked by Barney and Darin in the same year in the book Network Society. In the fifth chapter, Barney and Darin had come out the similar question of how the personal identity will be built surrounding the network society. This was also linked to The Power of Identity written by Castells in 1997, in which he analysed several kinds of identities with the rise of the network society named legitimizing identity, resistant identity and project identity. This essay written by Charles Cheung and ed...
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...ship between the personal homepage and people’s identity construction. It systematically analysed the characteristics of self-presentation online through personal homepages with using the face-to-face normal interaction as the comparison. Moreover, the author came out the factors which could influence the users making personal homepages based on certain researches and theories so that it is objective enough to take these factors in to consideration. Whereas, Cheung has come out only mainly the internet access and commercial ideologies as the basic factors of influencing the users making personal homepage, this is still seemed narrow to some extent. More representative factors need to be explored and investigated. However, this book and especially this chapter is a worthy read for the study of the internet and virtual space and its connection between the realities.
In “Modern Romance,” Celeste Biever describes romantic relationships in the Internet community. She describes how people can romantically be involved on the Internet and how the Internet teaches one to learn about a person from the inside out.In “Cyberspace and Identity,” Sherry Turkle also expresses her interest in the Internet and how it allows for the act of self-exploration. Even though their focus on what the Internet is used for are different from the perspective of one another, Biever and Turkle both see the Internet as a place for exploration in a general sense.
In an article called “Relationships, community, and Identity in the New Virtual Society” Arnold Brown explains two different identities one that he calls “found identity” and the other “made identity” (34). The found identity is one that is created by one true self, it’s based off your background, your religion, your sex, everything that truly defines who you really are. And then there’s your made identity the one you make for yourself and how you wished to be seen. As technology advances, the easier it will be for young girls to create these made identity’s of out these famous celebrities, having them focus on things that don’t matter instead of valuing who they really are.
Have you ever thought about how technology is controlling your life? Then you should read Sherry Turkle’s “Growing Up Tethered”, and how her perspective on how technology and online interactions influence identity construction. “Growing up Tethered”, is a piece from her book, Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other, and in this essay, Mrs. Turkle identifies and examines the adolescents growing up tethered to the wide force of technology that has come to characterize society. In more detail “growing up tethered” is stating that today’s adolescents are connected to peer pressure and in most cast parent surveillance. Turkle believes that teens must always be available to their friends and that they need a phone
In the past, individual’s identities were often assigned to them by the hegemonic culture, largely based on their conceptualization of sameness. The hegemonic culture dominated identity discourse by drawing distinct boundaries between racial and cultural groups, separating and defining them. Modern discourse however, has seen individuals taking the power of assigning identity signifiers for themselves often in periods of great social change. While times of resistance are often the most easily recalled examples of this, subtle trends in society a tremendous impact, often without the conscience knowledge of the society. In the past two decades, Western Culture has been witness to a radical transformation in identification processes. Technology has become increasingly pivotal to popular culture, and as such, it has had a profound influence on the way we create and affirm our sense-of-self. Identification categories have become less rigid compared to thirty years ago, and people are on average more open to identifying across boundaries. The process of blurring identity lines between distinct groups has re-distributed the power of assigning signifiers from the hegemonic element of popular culture to the individual. Means of instant information distribution and exchange, discourse and academic retrieval, such as instant messengers, social networking sites, Wikipedia, et al are perhaps some of the most influential because of their instantaneousness. While the lines have become blurred on a social level, individual identities are often affirmed.
Identity, an ambiguous idea, plays an important part in today’s world. To me identity can be defined as who a person is or what differentiates one person from another. Identity would be a person’s name, age, height, ethnicity, personality, and more. A quote by Anne Sexton states “It doesn't matter who my father was; it matters who I remember he was”(Anne Sexton). This quote helps me define identity because I believe it is saying that identity is what people are remembered by. When some people think of identity, words such as, uniqueness, distinctiveness, or individuality may come to mind. However, I disagree with this because when I think of identity I think of mimicry, self-consciousness, or opinions.
As case and point, “the impact of the Internet is far greater than any other communicative tool in the history of mass communications” (Elliot, 2008, para. 1). With an expansive, yet extremely convenient means to electronically join people through business, relationships, education and more, Sociology assumes the ...
"Finding One's Own in Cyberspace." Composing Cyberspace. Richard Holeton. United States: McGraw-Hill, 1998. 171-178. SafeSurf. Press Release.
Multiple identities have been increased by the creation of cyberspace communications according to "Cyberspace and Identity" by Sherry Turkle. Turkle uses four main points to establish this argument. Her first point is that online identity is a textual construction. Secondly she states that online identity is a consequence-free moratorium. Turkle's third point is online identity expands real identity. Finally, her last point states that online identity illustrates a cultural concept of multiplicity. I disagree with many aspects of her argument and I have found flaws in her argument. Technology is an area that does not stand still and consequently outpaced Turkle's argument.
Before the internet, our characteristics such as style, identity, and values were primarily exposed by our materialistic properties which psychologists define as the extended self. But people’s inferences to the idea of online self vs. offline self insisted a translation to these signals into a personality profile. In today’s generation, many of our dear possessions have been demolished. Psychologist Russell W belk suggest that: “until we choose to call them forth, our information, communications, photos, videos, music, and more are now largely invisible and immaterial.” Yet in terms of psychology there is no difference between the meaning of our “online selves” and “offline selves. They both assist us in expressing important parts of our identity to others and provide the key elements of our online reputation. Numerous scientific research has emphasized the mobility of our analogue selves to the online world. The consistent themes to these studies is, even though the internet may have possibly created an escape from everyday life, it is in some ways impersonating
For instance, while displaying one’s identity through gregarious media sanctions the utilization of different media than traditionally used such as status updates, photos, and videos to construct identity, the media does not always accurately portray our true selves. By posting specific photos and comments, individual's highlight certain characteristics of themselves while also omitting or hiding other facts and characteristics. In an example, if a college student posts only pictures of themselves attending bars and parties while also posting comments on friends’ walls about such activities, they will highlight their “identity” of partying and debauchery. Conversely, they would be debasing all other aspects of their lives that comprise their identities, such as schoolwork, family, and personal relationships. This use of social media can create a false identity, portraying a “person” to the outside world who may not truly exist or may be more complex than the “person” one portrays through their social media sites. This is how, as Roberts suggests, one ultimately creates an “empty identity
Technologies are indispensable and highly associated with individuals, businesses and organizations. Numerous eminent technologies are developed by firms and industries to gain competitive advantage in the market. The mode of lifestyle of individuals was also affected by technologies, either in social or occupational. Social media are one of the technologies which were invented and became contemporary prevalent. The origin of social media came from the “Usernet” inaugurated by Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis of the Duke University in 1979. It was “a worldwide discussion system that allowed internet users to post public messages” (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010: 60). It then grew into various kinds of social websites and users of these websites surged. Two major concepts of social media were constantly discussed with it – Web 2.0 and User Generated Content. Web 2.0 is the foundation of social media which published composite information provided by massive users, whereas User Generated Content states the content shown in these websites and how they would be utilized. Kaplan and Haenlein (2010: 62) classified social media into six categories – “blogs”, “social networking sites”, “virtue social worlds”, “collaborative projects”, “content communities” and “virtue game worlds”. The first three are regarded as high level of self-presentation or self-disclosure and the latter three are perceived as low level of self-presentation or self-disclosure in which individuals could avoid being exposed to the outside world by disguise. In terms of the degree of social presence or media richness, blogs and collaborative projects are the highest, social networking sites and content communities are in the medium and the lowest is the virtue social worlds and v...
In the January 18th, 2012 New York Times article “The False Ideals of the Web”, Jaron Lanier attempts to take a very difficult issue – one that many view in terms of black or white – and find some middle ground. Unfortunately, what he ends up doing in the article is create an either/or situation, rather than find any middle ground. In the end we are left in the same situation that we started with.
Shafie, L., Nayan, S., & Osman, N. (2012). Constructing Identity through Facebook Profiles: Online Identity and Visual Impression Management of University Students in Malaysia. Procedia - Social AndBehavioral Sciences, 65,
The Web. 11 Nov. 2013.. http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/teens-social-media_b50664> Floridi, Luciano. The Construction Of Personal Identities Online. Minds & Machines 21.4 (2011): 477-479.
This paper aims to explore the different reasons behind people having different personas in Twitter and real-life through a look at how the social networking site provides a unique opportunity for self...