I am following a girl that is figuring out how to be a good wife, good mother, good teacher and a good person as she finds herself through different storms of life. She is honest, open and leaves me wanting to learn more with each read. She is so quick to confess flaws she finds in herself and through her posts she seems very real. I would hate to think she is an entirely different person on the other end of the blog, however, there is always that possibiltiy.
As Bayam points out in Chapter 5, "When people's bodies arent' visible, will people like about who they are? Can they be known? Can they be trusted? Can the relationships they form be valid." He continues to discuss how the notion has always been believed in many cultures that every one has one true self, and yet, digital media is changing this belief up by allowing people to desembody their identities. This discussion opens that, while many honest people are using the internet blogging and posting on SNS, there is still the idea that most people are going to put themselves in the light in which they choose to be seen by the public. Therefore, this choice allows people to change or tweak as they see fit. What I liked most about the Bayam's discussion was the cues and competence. This explains how people can still be honest but basically they are deciding how their audience will perceive them. This is what I am hoping for my blogger. I think she is honest but is leading us down confessions and tell-all posts so that we get to know her better and root for her when she isn't quite so perfect.
In Turke's chapter, describes online identities as something that we self-create to allow ourselves the freedom. She best describes internet identity by saying that it is the new way for us to construct who we are in life. My blogger, Katie, does just this type of writing. She is describing herself and her views as if she is figuring it all out as she writes from day to day. I feel that Turkle's observations of how people change or construct to put pieces of self together is true for my blogger. One of Turkle's questions that was raised in the article read, will the commupter mediated relationships satisfy our need to connect? I thought this was interesting because my blogger really does have a lot of feedback (she is a published blog), and I thought about how she asks for responses to things or writes about controversial topics and I wonder if this is her main source of friendship feedback. She has talked about how she hasn't made a lot of new friends in Florida where they recently moved. Maybe the computer, for my blogger, is replacing he human connection. This then would suggest that some of her confessions and honest raw material is coming from a place of wanting to connect with her readers and give them a reason to write and discuss back with her. As natural and wonderful as she sounds on her blog, I have thought before (I have followed her blog before this class), that we could really be friends (not in creepy, stalker way), but I have just thought of how we read the same books, have kids, great husband ect.. and yet Walther's article pointed out something that stood out to me. It explains that the unique thing about CMC is the time that can or may be spend in editing writing. This time allows someone to really put effort into exactly waht they want to say. This idea makes me consider that there is a possiblity that what she puts out there may not match up to make some awesome, fun girl on the other side of her writing. There is a chance that she is just a really great writer.
Yes, Oh yes! People of today day are so guilty of trying to be somebody tney are not! Identity is an important roll that shows characteristics of each individual separately. Why are we not happy with ourselves. Why do we want to be somebody else? We sit behind the monitor and pretend to be someody else. We create a new person that really don't exist.
ReplyDeleteWill, I think one thing to consider is that Niki's blogger is not necessarily trying to be someone she's not, but rather putting forward one side (maybe an idealized side?) of herself. As we discussed in the chat, we all have different roles, and we have, in Turkle's words, different "aspects of self"--my professor self is not the same as my "friend" self, but they're both me.
ReplyDeleteNiki's point about writing is a good one--in a mostly text-based world, if you can write well you can do a better job at presenting the side(s) you want to show to the world.
Yes, I agree. The internet has made it way too easy to pretend to be someone else or just a better version of who they really are. However, just because a person is acting like a different person online doesn't mean that everything they say is a lie, they are just more able to say the things they want to say in real life but just do it on the internet.
ReplyDeleteI think it's good that the blogger shares; I don't get the impression that she's pretending, because I were a minimum of 5 different hats a day and they put me into a different mode. So having the gift to relay a much felt message for many people is helpful to her and the audience. Although, she blogs I talk to myself.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you Mandy, people always try to make themselves better then what they actually are in reality. Most people are not good communicators f2f but rather well ones over texing. As crazy as it may sound it's true! I know a young man who has a lot to say over a text message but can't express his feelings f2f. Doesn't make him a lier or a bad person either. We are all just different.
ReplyDelete" It explains that the unique thing about CMC is the time that can or may be spend in editing writing."
ReplyDeleteI'll say! I've been sitting here at the computer going on two hours reading, re-reading, writing, rewriting and then when I post a comment read it again and think "that sounds dumb" but it's there and I'm not going to redo it.