IdEntitY
Friday, August 28, 2009 by Carrie819
The idea of identity is the meaning of who we are, in terms of our gender, age and nationality, something that is considered to be fixed. Each individual has a different and unique identity. In new media technologies such as cyberspace, the idea of identity tends to be quite confusing sometimes. As we cannot judge nor have a clear idea of people that are online are actually being honest and reveal their true identities, as we cannot see or touch them. It has been suggested that 'you could be a dog online', basically, anyone could be anything online.
Turkle argues that identity can be multiple, there is so singular and standard identity, it is fluid. It is often that we use different identities against different people, not just through the internet, but also in the 'real world' in a face to face communication. Goffman also suggests that our identity is a kind of performance, it is not just something that is inside us, but also the consciousness of how others think of us and somehow, we are representing ourselves by stereotypes, standards, sexuality, age and other discourses that mode us into who we are.
In last week’s tutorial we talked about authenticity and how cyberspace challenged this notion. I think the idea of whether or not people are being authentic online varies from different situations and different people. For those who want to build relationships with others online without taking any responsibilities in real life may not be as honest or authentic to their identities. For someone, like me, using social networking site such as facebook, my identity would be authentic as I know that people who could see my profile would only be my friends, well, at least I know that they are safe to share my information to. Hence I think identity in new media is a complicated term to define as nobody knows the true identity that is hidden inside each of us.
Turkle argues that identity can be multiple, there is so singular and standard identity, it is fluid. It is often that we use different identities against different people, not just through the internet, but also in the 'real world' in a face to face communication. Goffman also suggests that our identity is a kind of performance, it is not just something that is inside us, but also the consciousness of how others think of us and somehow, we are representing ourselves by stereotypes, standards, sexuality, age and other discourses that mode us into who we are.
In last week’s tutorial we talked about authenticity and how cyberspace challenged this notion. I think the idea of whether or not people are being authentic online varies from different situations and different people. For those who want to build relationships with others online without taking any responsibilities in real life may not be as honest or authentic to their identities. For someone, like me, using social networking site such as facebook, my identity would be authentic as I know that people who could see my profile would only be my friends, well, at least I know that they are safe to share my information to. Hence I think identity in new media is a complicated term to define as nobody knows the true identity that is hidden inside each of us.