Theoretical Context and Discussion
This area is arranged by theme because of the context that is theoretical the conversation of information interlaced rather than placed into split parts so that you can supply a cohesive argument and a fuller image of the complexity of online NBG&SO construction. I additionally genuinely believe that this particular organization better reflects the process that is iterative of information, as scientists usually move between existing literature and their information often times through the research procedure. Consequently, we arranged this conversation to emphasize three salient themes that we observed within my iterative article on both the info and literature that is existing
The relevance and effect of platform affordances on use and later identity construction.
Consideration of true self, online identity construction, and how sharing one’s true self may encourage community on Tumblr.
The discursive nature of labeling practices and their implications for the bigger discussion about sex and intimate orientation.
The business of those themes can also be essential as each analysis develops upon the last. It really is necessary to very first know how platform affordances may shape the utilization of that platform to then know the way affordances and use impact layered identification construction. Finally, an awareness of layered identification construction on Tumblr permits for study of NBG&SO labeling methods which also just simply take put on Tumblr.
Networked Publics and Platform Playgrounds
Social networking has made “widespread publicness” an unprecedentedly common phenomenon, and “social media introduce a conundrum of visibility…, as people’s mediated acts are both noticeable and hidden in networked publics” (Baym & boyd, 2012, pp. 321-322). Boyd’s (2011) study on networked publics provides framework for how exactly to think about mediated communities and publics. Unsurprisingly, she explains that networked publics act like face-to-face (F2F) publics in function; however, technological affordances shape exactly exactly how individuals relate with each other (boyd, 2011, p. 39). Acknowledging aftereffects of a platform on its users, boyd (2011) argues that “networked publics aren’t just publics networked together, however they are publics which were changed by networked news, its properties, and its own prospective” (p. 42). Bryce J. Renninger (2015) has recently used this framework produced by boyd (2011) to Tumblr, showing that it is a networked public in conformity with both the “four types of features that play a salient part in constructing social networks as networked publics” (boyd, 2011, p. 43), along with her four affordances of networked publics. Developing Tumblr as a networked public then permits us to examine the methods the architecture associated with the platform it self influences the kind of publics and counterpublics (known here as communities) that collect here.
Although the affordances of platforms usually just work quietly when you look at the history during usage, fundamentally they shape both the way they are employed and also the forms of communities which use them (Flanagin, Flanagin, & Flanagin, 2010). Social network platforms by themselves are perhaps maybe not basic entities but instead rhetorically and politically constructed (Flanagin et al., 2010; Gillespie, 2010). The deliberate shaping of platform affordances impacts not just its demographics, as Tarleton Gillespie (2010) records, but in addition the information users share there. Consequently, several types of media and SNSs can be used for various purposes, and, in change, requirements are set for just what is suitable discourse for various platforms. Ilana Gershon (2010) defines the collective choice of exactly how to make use of various news as well as the “appropriate social uses of technology” as news ideologies (p. 6), and these media ideologies play a factor that is key choosing which platform to share with you specific information (Renninger, 2015). Gershon (2010) is targeted on the aspect that is social of ideologies, as Renninger (2015) records, in which he continues to spell out the need of “acknowledging exactly exactly how the look and politics of technical platforms may play a role in impacting their use” (p. 6). That is, the look associated with the platform impacts use in several methods, two of that are especially appropriate right right right here. First, the method in which developers mean a platform to be utilized might not be the way that users actually find yourself making use of the platform. For instance, Tumblr states that it “effortlessly allows you to share anything” (“About, ” n.d. ) and that “Tumblr celebrates imagination. Tumblr wants you to definitely show your self easily and use Tumblr to mirror who you really are, and everything you love, think, and stay for” (“Community directions, ” 2015)|yourself freely and use Tumblr to reflect who you are, and what you love, think, and stand for” (“Community Guidelines, ” 2015 you to express. Although Tumblr encourages imagination with its users, it appears not likely that the intended intent behind Tumblr had been for the gathering of marginalized teams just like the LGBTQIA community or intimately explicit NSFW communities like those Tiidenberg (2012, 2013, 2014a, 2014b) examines.
2nd, the affordances associated with the platform shape real use, community, and identification development. This is certainly, just what a platform can perform doing greatly influences exactly just how it really is utilized. While this could initially appear to be a concept that is simple its outcome is more complicated. Consider that in this test, significantly less than 22% of users had an About Me web web page to their Tumblelogs (see Table 1). This appears it allows them unlimited space to share information about themselves like it should be a primary point of identity construction for users. Nevertheless, the About Me page just isn’t frequently a part of a standard weblog layout and needs to be added as a additional web page. This calls for significantly more than the type that is fill-in-the-blank of building that occurs on other SNSs and on occasion even within the bio package element of a Tumblelog. This effort that is additional add an About Me page may account for—or at the very least add to—the little range users whom decide to add one in the dwelling of the web log.
Tumblr’s unique tagging system can be a fantastic exemplory instance of affordances shaping use. While metacommunicative discourse in hashtags is typical across platforms (Daer, Hoffman, & Goodman, 2014), Tumblr enables both areas and punctuation ( aside from the comma which separates the tags), which often enables for extended, more complex metacommentary about the information of the post that frequently simply happens when you look at the tags in the place of appearing into the real text of the post or reblog. 2 Since tags aren’t carried along whenever users reblog content, its rendered temporary commentary or categorization on websites when it comes to reblogging, though these tags stick to the post associated with individual that penned them and are usually still searchable browse around this site on Tumblr writ big. This ephemeral facet of Tumblr’s system that is tagging another room, aside from bio containers and About Me pages, that LGBTQIA bloggers can, plus in some situations do, exercise NBG&SO identification construction; 3 this can be part of exactly what will be talked about within the next part as “layered identification. ”