Core concepts: Identity, "social stage" , performativity, context collapse, network effects in platforms, four key affordances of online communication.

We introduced this book with me. Now we move on to you - all of you, through whom culture passes and takes new shape. You are a huge part of social media - but what are the factors that come together to make you into you? Identity is an iteration of the self that links individuals with how they are perceived by others. Identity combines how you see yourself and how others see you, in an endless riff that becomes your positioning in publics and in the world.

Next step: Create a profile

Let's imagine that you were told that you must create a profile to continue reading this book or get a grade associated with it. Who would you be? I imagine many of you would reply, "Well I'm not sure yet. Who is the profile for?" The publics you are presenting yourselves to shape your identity at any given time. So if it turned out the profile you are creating is just for other students and instructors in the class you are taking, perhaps you'd keep the profile simple, and maybe work to make yourself look smart. Now compare that to the profile you might craft for a professional site, liked LinkedIn. There are probably some distinct differences. In some of my courses students share LinkedIn profiles and when I see one, I feel like I'm meeting a whole new person! While students tend to make their profiles somewhat muted for our course management system, in LinkedIn those same students look directly at the camera and proudly wear suits. They boast of their accomplishments. In class they want to blend in; but when applying for jobs, they want to stand out.

And now compare your student and professional profile to the profile you might use in online dating. Is it different? I imagine so! Perhaps the focus moves to looking attractive and inviting to attract those you are interested in.

And how about your gaming profile? Maybe your gaming profile is avatar-based. But does that mean you don't spend much time designing that avatar, since it's "not you?" Of course not; it has become standard in the gaming industry to charge significant sums for downloadable content to customize your avatar or "skin" - because your avatar is you, for one or more gaming publics. And that avatar and profile will influence how people treat you in-game; they constitute your in-game identity.

Who are you? Offline? Online?

Like the concept of information, identity is a notion that used to be amorphous and philosophical. You couldn't easily set "identity" apart from the human to whom the identity belonged. Today, though, humans try to project every unseen aspect of our lives onto the binary-minded digital world. And that means the formerly shapeless concept of identity has to take shape, and if we want it to represent us online, we have know what we want and put it out there.

As a human you don't just have one identity, or even one online identity and also one offline identity. Our legal world and policies from platforms like Facebook may limit people into having one identity, but in life both online and offline we play many roles, so we have many identities.

Two theorists have given us important tools to understand these identity roles, although both theorists began writing about these roles before the internet drew so many of us to craft identities online.

Backtrack to the 1950s. Social roles in North America were rigid. Then the sociologist Erving Goffman put forward a whole new way of looking at identity in his 1956 book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (overview in embedded video below). Goffman wrote that we are all actors on a "social stage," who play particular roles to create our identities, and that these roles change as we interact with different people and situations. Our selves can only really be understood when we look at all of the roles we play.

Then the cultural critic and feminist theorist Judith Butler advanced and honed the notion of identity roles in her 1990 book Gender Trouble (overview in embedded video below), focusing on the roles that define gender. Butler's theories introduced the notion that gender itself is our playing of roles like "boy," "girl," "man," and "woman", rather than these being "natural" or connected to our biologies. Butler's concept of performativity says that roles like gender are only constructed through our performances of them; they would not exist without our acting them into existence.

So if these theories have truth in them - and I believe they do - what does this mean for our identities online? Well, our online identities offer some additional evidence that gender and other social roles are constructed. Many early internet adopters were thrilled at the possibilities of expressing themselves without being defined by their bodies. But what we have learned from maturing of the internet - aided by Goffman's and Butler's theories - is that humans' "selves" have never existed only in or on our bodies. We perform our selves into existence. And so when we perform ourselves into being online, we carry much of that same old offline, embodied baggage with us

Context collapse

What if the profile I asked you to create above was for more than one of the publics I listed? What if you learned it would be associated with both your dating and your LinkedIn profiles? And also visible to your network where you connect with family? If this would make you feel uncomfortable, what you are feeling is the threat of context collapse. Context collapse is when the different contexts or worlds you associate with overlap or become mixed together. Friends snicker at an embarrassing comment your mother makes in reply to your photo online. A job recruiter sees an Instagram photo of you partying and decides not to recruit you.

Political views expressed online can lead to particularly fraught situations. For example, white supremacists preparing to demonstrate in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017 discovered that when alerted about the demonstrators' intentions, AirBnB canceled demonstrators' Charlottesville reservations. After the demonstrations, a campaign on Twitter to identify and publicly shame protestors led to problems for some protestors - and for some who simply looked like them. Whether or not you agree with the actions of anyone involved in these situations, they demonstrate how quickly views expressed online or offline can follow your identity across contexts and cause significant damage.

Context collapse is a constant danger as our online identities proliferate. In her interviews with teens, danah boyd found teens develop strategies for dealing with context collapse including using coded language. It is also common practice for people to try to keep their social media accounts separate, and hide some details or even entire accounts from specific people and publics (as was discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.)

What keeps us using platforms even when interacting on them feels uncomfortable or compromising? Well, network effects, which mean that the more the platform is used, the more valuable it is - because the more likely it is where we go to interact with family, or friends, or customers, or all of these.

When my 'professor' and 'mother' roles overlap

I deal with context collapse too. As a professor of social media, I encourage my students to embrace their online experiences as part of their real worlds; in this professor role I recognize the value in online interactions. And then I head home from class to find my 15-year-old son has been on social media for hours. I freak out; Enough screen time! I shout. I don't care what you're doing on there!

It feels hypocritical that I behave so differently in these two roles. So why do I do it? I ask myself this a lot, but I only have tentative answers; they have to do with what I perceive as distinct responsibilities in each role I play. When I teach, I don't want my students to shut me out; I know from experience that they are only willing to examine their online interactions in my class when they feel comfortable I'm not judging them. But my job as a mother is not to help my son understand his online life. My job is to keep him safe and healthy, and when he spends too much time in virtual worlds, his safety and health slip out of my control.

Why context collapse is more extreme online

You could say I am getting off easy with my own professor-mother context collapse. My mother role is mostly an offline role, so context collapse between my mother and professor roles online is not frequent, and it doesn't last forever online. Whatever roles you feel the need to keep distinct in your life, it is likely their online expressions that you need to worry about the most. There are four key affordances of online communication that Danah Boyd emphasizes are far more pronounced than in offline communication (It's Complicated, pg. 11). They are:

• persistence: online content and expressions can last for a very long time
• visibility: many audiences and publics may be able to see what you post over time
• spreadability: it's nearly effortless to share content posted online
• searchability: content posted online can be searched for

These affordances raise the stakes of online context collapse and communication in general. When we consider who controls our data, and what we agree to when we agree to use their services, it can be especially chilling to realize how easily what we express online might be visible to unintended audiences. They may spread this information to other publics, who will be able to search and find it easily. Finally, his threat will persist for a very long time.

Identity

Identity is an iteration of the self that links individuals with how they are perceived by others

"social stage"

Sociologist Erving Goffman wrote in his 1956 book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life that we are all actors on a "social stage," who play particular roles to create our identities, and that these roles change as we interact with different people and situations. Our selves can only really be understood when we look at all of the roles we play.

performativity

In her 1990 book Gender Trouble, Judith Butler's concept of performativity says that roles like gender are only constructed through our performances of them; they would not exist without our acting them into existence

context collapse

Context collapse is when the different contexts or worlds you associate with overlap or become mixed together.

network effects in platforms

the more the platform is used, the more valuable it is - because the more likely that platform is where we go to interact with family, or friends, or customers, or all of these

four key affordances of online communication

There are four affordances of online communication that danah boyd emphasizes are far more pronounced than in offline communication (It's Complicated, pg. 11). They are: persistence (online content and expressions can last for a very long time), visibility (many audiences and publics may be able to see what you post over time), spreadability (it's nearly effortless to share content posted online), and searchability (content posted online can be searched for.)

Did you get all that?

Whoever you are, here is what you should know

in his 1956 book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Erving Goffman wrote that:

• A.) we play particular roles to create our identities, and that these roles change as we interact with different people and situations.
• B.) Our selves can only really be understood when we look at all of the roles we play.
• C.) We each have a true self that is most evident in pictures.
• D.) All of the above
• E.) A and B only

Judith Butler's concept of performativity says what?

• A.) Women and men are inherently different and that gets us into trouble.
• B.) Gender roles would not exist without our acting them into existence.
• C.) We each have a true self, but we often ignore it to please others.
• D.) All of the above
• E.) A and C only

boyd discusses one or more distinct characteristics of social media that set it apart from older forms of communication; which is/are these? (Choose the most complete correct answer.)

• A.) Visibility
• B.) Persistence
• C.) Searchability
• D.) Spreadability
• E.) Communication
• F.) Privacy
• G.) Imagery
• H.) All of the above
• I.) A through D only

Which are examples of context collapse? (Choose the most complete correct answer.)

• A.) Your coworkers see your vacation photos from when you said you were on sick leave, and they report you.
• B.) Your new profile picture gets over three hundred "likes".
• C.) Your new girlfriend gets upset when she sees you liking images of other women in bikinis online.
• D.) All of the above
• E.) A and C only

Write about an example of context collapse you have seen or experienced online.