Identity and Representations

There are many ways in which identity is constructed through the means of technology. Who we are formally originates from the roots of our families. Our identity is rooted in our gender, class, political ideas, belief and custom, subculture. They all each individually help define us and construct our overall personalities.

Media and Identity are both closely linked. The example I looked at in detail was the events that took place around the events of the 9/11 bombings. The events were mediated, I found out about the tragedy due to the use of media and its way of communicating ideas. I personally wasn’t in New York when the events took place; my understanding was constructed through the media’s broadcasting. There were broadcasts all over the internet and television, which was the initial way of transferring messages to those, like me, who weren’t actually present at the scene of the tragic event.

The presentation of oneself is constructed in a variety of ways. As humans it has become noticeable that we all perform roles and these roles are fabricated through our identity. Goffman said “Identity is a process”, a way where by in which we create our identity and present to a variety of audiences. An example of this includes writing a Facebook status. This, as a whole, helps someone to present themselves in an online personality they have constructed.

Very rarely you will see a true depiction of someone’s everyday life; to us as “readers” it may be seen to be boring or unnecessary. Instead, the majority of statuses posted will far fetched and exciting. Similarly, the status’ will be in some lights a way of one to post something that needs attention brought to. In today’s society, Facebook is a way to express feelings and emotions and has been to known to explore messages of sympathy when someone’s life is sadly taken from them.

The profile pictures someone individually selects have been chosen out of choice, they aren’t necessarily a true image of what the person looks like. The photos could have been edited or modified to make them look, in their opinion, better.

Furthermore it has been suggested that you could potentially have a different identity online in comparison to your real life identity seen in flesh. Referring back to the Internet being a performance for some people, an example of this could be the website Tumblr. People spend time to develop a page to construct what they believe is their personality, but by doing so without realising they could be creating a different identity to their Twitter or Facebook page. A Tumblr page is a lot more artistic in comparison to Facebook and a Twitter feed as such only allows you to post something of 140 characters at a time, so when doing so you have to be particular in what you say.

Celebrities are in fact becoming more famous through the use of the internet and sites such as Twitter. It is their way of advertising new projects and connecting with their fans.

It is also important to note that identity and interface are closely linked. Designing WebPages helps identify companies and similarly this is done by the layout and choice of colours and images presented to the audience. When having to fill out forms about you on the internet, this raises a lot of diverse issues. Web 2.0 allows drop down menus to help identify ones personality, but are there ever enough drops down menus? Years before, this was the case. There were never enough options available for everyone, when it came to politics and religion the selections were narrow.

So, if it is suggested that we are performing roles, the main question is who are we actually performing to?