Production of the 'Self' in the Digital Age by Yasmin Ibrahim

Author:Yasmin Ibrahim
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

Conclusion

The self, through the gaze and validation of others, acquires social capital in online platforms. In tandem, impression management becomes an intrinsic element of digital living, re-asserting the salient concept of self-love and the inherent instabilities it presents. The moral gaze of others can both be a validation and check on the virtuous self. Nevertheless, Rousseau’s prophetic caution against self-ruin and social denigration can be further extended to the digital age where an inflamed self-love if unchecked can lead to limitless possibilities for destruction where an obsession with the self and peer validation, and equally a lack of inhibition with what we reveal in curating ourselves can lead to known and unknown risks (Ibrahim 2008). An unchecked amour-propre can not only heighten the inequalities in society but create fragile human relationships where we constantly seek communion with wider communities to validate ourselves and expect them to place us above others. As such it not only raises questions about the authenticity of the self but also the integrity of peer relationships.

The notion of the self on SNSs is both imagined through self-description and crafted through textual and multimedia environments but equally through its articulation and display of contacts and its ability to invite or deny communion with other users. In this sense, the concept of the self is anchored through both individual agency and imagination as well as other users’ gaze and consumption of these profiles. This explicit ethos of exposure, display and spectacle define the cultural ethos of SNSs. Self-exposure and narcissism gives a platform for re-definition of offline identities and new sociabilities that can in turn re-configure and re-define the notion of friendship and community in these spaces. SNSs also herald the emergence of complicit risk communities where personal information becomes social capital, which is traded and exchanged and where the concept of public or private can be defined through the nature of users’ access, gaze and the transactions and interactions they permit.

The culture of SNSs thrives on the narcissistic and the performative, on one hand, and reciprocity and exchange, on the other. Hence the potential dangers and risks of willingly disclosing and displaying personal details become part of the architecture or code of these sites. The appropriation of new technologies by individuals in order to communicate, to form new communities and to maintain existing relationships signifies new ways in which risk becomes embedded and encoded into our social practices, posing new ethical and legal challenges that inadvertently expand the landscape of risk.

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