Identity in the Social Network
Social networking sites are growing everyday in numbers. This has brought out a new topic of discussion, how is identity represented in the social network? When online, people can create their own identity, as well as, claim to be whoever they want to be.
This type of identity can be equated to an actor playing a role in a movie. People can decide on putting on an identity that is totally different from the reality. Questions have been raised as to what makes up private and public interaction, in addition to the links between these manufactured identities. In the online experience, the individual and the audience are electronically attached through the use of signs they choose to represent themselves with. There are no physical traces of the communicators or the possibility of ees tracking an individual who is online. These unidentified audiences are always shaped by online platforms they choose.
Users of the internet use their imagination to project, negotiate, as well as revise their social hallucination. They use their imaginations to come up with online selves, and create the stage and set in which these identities exist.One important thing to note about identity is that, it derives from changes or immersion in social structural factors like social connections. Moreover, identity development is always conceptualized as iterative evolutionary process. In creating identity, individuals usually accumulates skills that will fit their role-related activities in the social network. Just like in the film “The Social Network”, it is evident that peoplee are able to reinvent their identity.
The movie takes a look into the internet identities that have already been created. Characters like Eduardo have a different identity online; he is listed as being single though he has a girlfriend.In conclusion, the social network is a deliberate playful space that can allow individuals to create their identities in reaction to their associates, for example, Eduardo in “The Social Network Movie” creates a site that people can rate women. Furthermore, the social network allows an individual to play around with presenting themselves and the relationship of these online identities to others. However, these identities can be used in important discussions, conversations, emotional bond maintenance, as well as, informational exchanges.
