The Collaborative Self: From Collectivity to Individuality and What Blogs Can Teach Us About Identity
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Date
2014-01-23
Authors
Hagenah, Nathan
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Publisher
University of Waterloo
Abstract
This paper uses blogs as a starting point for an examination of how identity is constructed collaboratively through a series of linguistically mediated social processes. The goal is to establish a theoretical framework for understanding individual identity as rooted in media, language, and society and the result of collective social processes as opposed to their genesis. It draws together conceptual models from theorists in sociology, media studies, and genre theory to explore how selves are created in the online contexts of blogs and how those concepts relate to wider cultural concerns and anxieties related to the construction of individual identity. By examining issues of privacy, anonymity, and authenticity as they relate to blogs and bloggers, this paper aims to provide a view of individual identity as contextually situated yet continuous across social contexts and which is the result of collaborative, collective social processes.
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Keywords
blog, identity, media, society, language, self, privacy, anonymity, pseudonymity, authenticity