Facebook Guises – Week 4

As discussed in the week 4 lecture podcast 4.3, the way we make sense in our life is through narratives. In order to construct self, we create narrative to help us make sense of what could be a series of random events. Facebook is the social networking website that has provided us with the ability to tell our story, our narrative. With creation of the ‘Timeline’ feature, one page details all the major events we experience, every opinion we voiced and every photograph we shared. However we have reached a point in which Facebook is not about telling the truth, its entirety is based on lies and the wastage of time, money and energy.

The existence of Facebook has given birth to a new culture for the younger generations. It started as a way of providing a small window into people’s lives, to expose the simple and mostly mundane truths that most people are curious about. i.e relationship statuses, birthdays, life updates. But this small window turned to a floodgate of lies, similar to the James Frey scandal. People feel that that since they are so exposed to everyone they must lie in order to satisfy their peers, similar to any social pressure. However, Facebook took judgment to a global scale. So, Facebook no longer became about connecting people, eventually it became apparent that all the friends you may have, are not really your friends, not at all people you are in physical contact with. They are virtual acquaintances, yet even these people who we barely know and don’t ever speak to are people that we are trying to impress, through the medium of Facebook and the tools in which the site provides.  “People are conscious of who is viewing their online constructions and thus, they actively construct the ideal self formation in line with how they want to be perceived. Therefore, the online construction of the self is influenced by the individual's offline social identities or subjective positions (Chatora, 2010)”, (Heivadi, et al, 2013)

 

You want to have more and more friends because that is a measure of popularity, the more friends you have the more people like you. Photographs are no longer immortalized memories; they are belittled into a selfie, ways of showing off superficial entities to people who don’t care about you. In the end I wonder who invented these new standards of cool. And just how far do we have to stretch the truth about our selves to satisfy Facebook.

References:

• Heivadi, T., M.A., & Khajeheian, D., PhD. (2013). Construction of social identity in social media: An investigation of iranian users' appearance in facebook. Interdisciplinary Journal of Contemporary Research in Business, 4(12), 547-555. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1370189880?accountid=16285
• Week 4 lecture podcast BA1002, 4.3, Network Narratives. 

Blog #2 Week 4 Networked Narratives.

Virtual Self Narratives: Construction & Control

By Meg Tallis

Image 1: Identity Management

          Hayden White was said to have believed that the real world is "inherently random and meaningless, and humans confer meaning by imposing narrative structure" (Van Luyn, 2013).  After hearing this, I attempted to establish how this theory might apply in relation to the way self-narratives are told within the confines of facebook.  How and why does Facebook facilitate the ordering of our life events in narrative form? Is it to help us find meaning? And if so,  what might their agenda be in assisting us with our meaning making? 

            McNeill (2012, p.104) gives insight into the ways in which Facebook establishes and reinforces Facebook community norms.  For example, when I created my Profile there were numerous personal details I was requested to give via a selection from drop down menus.  None of the menus have "other" as an option; therefore, it was a case of choose a social norm that you fit into or chose nothing at all. At many stages of my profile construction I found myself thinking "but none of those options are me... ".  I can now see how this is Facebook dictating which aspects of my life are deemed important and worth sharing, and I'm not sure I like it! 

            I thought next about what Van Luyn (2013) had said about self narratives being "constructs for a particular purpose and context".  I wondered what purpose Facebook might have in encouraging the networked construction of my self narrative.  The fact that my facebook friends have the option to encourage or criticize certain posts by way of comments or the "like button" shows that this collaborative construction of self is important on facebook.  This could have something to do with the concept associated with Australian Aboriginal Songlines, that "to exist is to be perceived" (Chatwin, 1987, p. 14).  How exactly we are perceived on Facebook by other users is another matter that I aim to look into in weeks to come.

Reference List

Chatwin, B. (1987). Songlines. London, England: Jonathan Cape.

 

McNeill, L. (2012). There is no "I" in network: Social networking sites and posthuman auto-

                
                biography. Biography, 35(1), 101-118. 

Van Luyn, A. (2013). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, 

                
                 Lecture 4: Networked narratives. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from  

                 
                 http://learnjcu.edu.au 

                Image Credits

Image 1: Fresh Element Interactive, (2011). Identity Management. Retrieved from 

                http://www.freshelement.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Identity-

                management_24682463_XS.jpg

Week 4 - Sacred Communication in the Information Age

Regarding the Indigenous Australian concept of Dreaming, Stanner (1979) states that "a concept so impalpable and subtle naturally suffers badly by translation into our dry and abstract language" (p.23). Similarly, contemporary notions and expressions of sacredness tend to suffer from the conversion into digital information within the rational, commercial environment of online social networks. But there is, and must be, a place for sacredness within the framework of, for example, Facebook - because, as Stanner suggests, the drive to 'make sense' out of human experience (p.31) is a constitutional human trait, from which Facebook users of 2013 are not (at least not entirely) exempt.

Image - Link

Certainly it can be difficult to integrate authentic mythic or spiritual "content" into the Facebook framework, but the overwhelming urge to share the awe-inspiring experience of Life, and the pervasive, expansive nature of social networks which potentially allow more access to sharing than ever before, combine to produce a new and constantly evolving discourse of sacredness and spiritual meaning in this technological age.

Although, as McNeill (2012) suggests, "...the auto/biographical act of creating a Profile follows particular company guidelines and establishes community norms for participation" (p.104), it requires only a creative imagination to evade mundane responses to these standard questions. For example, one woman expresses eloquently under the category of Religious Views: Love in motion; a man lists his Political Views: Free Human; while yet another female friend works for Mother Earth (to master the art of embodying Love in the human form).

In her lecture, Ariella Van Luyn described the concept of humanism, coupled with the rise of science, as a significant contributor to the way the modern west views the world. She described it as way of thinking of the world as 'knowable' and measurable in a scientific way. There are, however, sub-cultures that exist within western society, fully capable of using and embracing technology, who do not consider the world in terms of being knowable, but rather are focused on the mysterious creative qualities of existence. There is extensive evidence of these sub-cultures in countless contributions to the Facebook network that differ from the conventional types of information offerings the site encourages - types of information offerings which are easily subjected to the aims of a commercial organisation.

References

McNeill, L. (2012). There is no "I" in network: Social networking sites and posthuman auto/biography. Biography 35(1), 101-118. University of Hawai'i Press.

Stanner W.E.H. (1997). White man got Dreaming: Essays 1938-1973. Canberra, Australia: Australian National University Press.

Van Luyn, A. (2013). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives, and the making of place, week 4 notes. [Podcast]. Retrieved from https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/bbcswebdav/pid-1244821-dt-content-rid-961754_1/courses/13-BA1002-CNS-INT-SP2/BA1002_4.3_Networked_Narratives_-_iPad_-_20130819_11.10.29AM.mp4

Images

Unknown artist. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10202097057086805&set=a.4615049493114.2193338.1198877909&type=1&theater

Icon of a Generation Blog week 5

ICON OF A GENERATION

By Janine Evans

The Kombi van has come to symbolize the ‘hippy’ era of the mid 1960’s; the countercultural values questioning: race relations, authority, sexuality, women’s rights and the psychedelic drug scene.  ‘A symbol occurs when one thing comes to stand for another’ (Van Luyn, 2013). (Marenn Sagar refers to landscapes as symbols in his blog as well).  This iconic vehicle was born out of nothing more than a means of travel in post war Germany, yet has a place in the hearts of millions of people worldwide because it conjures up such an emotive response.  The universal symbol of the van is still the peace sign symbolizing the social revolution in the sixties.  After all, it is just a form of transport.

Kombi as a metaphor

The rhetoric used in my virtual network is specific to one type of vehicle and creates a satisfying and mostly amusing sense of place through the exchange of lighthearted banter.  Each vehicle ranges in condition from the ‘rat’ look to the immaculate but rarely is there any grandiose exchange.  Tuan (1991) writes, ‘the kinds of words and the tone of voice used, seems to infect the material environment’ (p. 690).  What is ‘written’, our vernacular, our metaphorical narratives in the virtual world can transcend distance as if the other users were in the same room, invoking a sense of place (Van Luyn, 2013).

Kombi as a symbol of lifestyle

The use of language on the Kombi Club website not only provides information but empowers me to feel a sense of community through belonging.  Van Luyn (2013) describes a place without language is merely space.  So not only do I feel like I’m in the right place here, I feel part of the symbolic ‘revolution’.

REFERENCE LIST:

Tuan, Y. (1991). Language and the making of place: A narrative-descriptive approach. In Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 81(4), 684-696.

Van Luyn, A. (2013). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, Lecture 5: Narratives and Places [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http: learnjcu.edu.au

IMAGE SOURCE:

Retrieved from: http://forums.kombiclub.com/showthread.php?18107-pics-of-unusual-Kombis-and-stuff/page8

Language, Reality and Imgur– Blog #3

Figure 1. I Got Magnets. (imgur 2013)

Imgur is a virtual space where users share images with one another and comment on these images. During the lecture it was said that “Language creates it's own reality.” (Van Luyn, A. 2013). This directly relates to the imgur concept, in that over time a subculture with it’s own language and social norms has evolved on imgur in its user base.

Reality is created by thinking, speaking, writing and sharing information with one another (Van Luyn, A. 2013). In an increasingly digital world, with so much information available, getting your point across quickly is essential. Imgur achieves this via using images with captions, which are called “memes”.

A meme is "an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture." (Dawkins, R. 1989). Imgur facilitates the sharing of images and memes between people and these memes reflect the current reality of the world through the language and concepts used.

People have a fundamental need to communicate, in order to develop and maintain relationships. People use language as a tool to facilitate this, culture and civilization itself is a result of language. (Tuan, 1991). But as technology progresses people are affected by “information overload” the phenomenon, where there is too much information to process, this has lead to the popularity of memes because information, culture, or jokes can be quickly communicated via picture and text, more quickly than traditional writing of the past.

 

Reference List

Van Luyn, A. (2013). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, narratives and the making of place, Lecture 5: Narratives and Places [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http: learnjcu.edu.au

Tuan, Y. (1991). Language and the making of place: A narrative-descriptive approach. In Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 81(4), 684-696.

Dawkins, R (1989). The Selfish Gene (2 ed.). Oxford University Press, p. 192, ISBN 0-19-286092-5

Blog 3 (Week 5) Callum Olearczyk FB

On Facebook, my identity has remained in sync with my true identity. This has allowed me to strengthen my identity as I have been able to manipulate and shape my "virtual  image" so as to present only the better qualities of my identity to others. 

In this sense my online identity is very much as real as my true identity however it is clouded somewhat as it does not give a complete insight into my true identity. 

The identities of the people I know in my social network are as real as they are in reality- this is because most are people whom of which I have interacted with in the real world. I have a rule; to be a friend of mine on Facebook requires that I must have met the individual at least once in the real world, hence everyone on my social network is real and most of all, honest in their online identity. 

Stephen Downes explains in his article on places in FB that the integration amongst Facebook users is reliant upon honest identities which suggests that the closer the virtual identity to one's real identity the more successful the connection between users (Downes, 2007).

The words which we use to describe virtual space reflect the fact that the internet is boundless by which it allows anyone to use it and transmit their influence across it to others. We perceive it as a means to do anything we can think of, such as selling, bullying, stealing,interacting, talking, etc. What is created is an entirely different world with freedom of will. Tuan refers to freedom when illustrating geographers views on the proposed "internet" (Tuan, 1991).

Places on FB    

The language used in my virtual network can invoke a sense of space and place. This includes: "post here", "like", "free", "exit", "poke".

My virtual network allows me to post status updates and/or images to which a can tag friends if I wish for them to see it. I can create an identity to show people who I am. The way I relate to others is only constricted by the fact that I can only express myself in words and not person.  

References: 

• Downes, S. (2007). Places to Go: Facebook. Journal of Online Education, 4(1), 95. Retrieved from  http://br9xy4lf5w.search.serialssolutions.com
• Tuan, Y. (1991). Language and the making of place: A narrative-descriptive approach. In Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 81(4), 684-696. 

  

Sharing Life, Realising Place (Week 5)

The creation of 'place' has been the theme across our subject so far. During our lectures this week, it has been identified that an important part of creating 'place' is the power of words.  However I pose the question: 'how many of us have defined personal characteristics that create our 'place'? An important step to comprehending our own making of 'place'.

Couchsurfing; creating your virtual 'place' by sharing your life

"Words alone...can have the power to render objects, formerly invisible because unattended, visible" (Tuan. Y. 1991, pp 684). Couchsurfing requires each user to create a profile. Within this profile you are provided with a pre-determined template that includes the following titles; Mission, Interests and Philosophy. These words are very powerful in the sense that they coerce you into defining elements of your life "What begins as undifferentiated space becomes place as we get to know it better and endow it with value" (Tuan. Y. 1979).  Tamlyn Magee's blog describes how the space is endowed with values when you "share the awe-inspiring experience of life, and the pervasive, expansive nature of social network". By creating a Couchsurfing profile, you are creating a virtual 'place'.

Until Couchsurfing prompted me to, I had never assessed how my 'place' had been created by my philosophies, interests and mission. Although I had a relative idea of what my philosophies, interests and missions were,  understanding these better by valuing them created my profile as a virtual 'place' in Couchsurfing.

Couchsurfing is a Social Network that requires you to understand and value your virtual 'place' through the use words. This network clearly displays how the power of words can define our 'place'.

References

Tuan. Y.(1991). Language and the making of place: A Narrative - Descriptive Approach. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 81(4), page 684 - 696.

Tuan. Y. (1979). Space and Place The Perspective of Experience. Great Brittan, London: Edward Arnold Publishers.

Couchsurfing International inc (2013) About. Retrieved from: www.couchsurfing.org/n/about 

Blog #2 Travelling through Pinterest

As my social network Pinterest, my last blog touched on the freedom it entails.  This blog will delve into the Connections made, the narratives and paths that are created. 

The virtual world and all social networks included are an extension of what we see as 'reality'. Pinterest is used to portray a virtual self, styles you're interested in and decor you want for the house. It is seen as 'pinboard' to publish likes and interests. Information 'pinned' can either be scene as a reflection of character or you can look it as a focus on place of space. The nature of collections on Pinterest motivates the user to add personal information and engage with other users ( C.Hall 2012). Travelling around the social network is evidently leaving footprints throughout it and gaining information of the 'places' you visit and the frequency.

Seven Sisters Songline, by Josephine Mick, Pipalyatjara, 1994.

The connections made within the Pinterest network can be related to the Indigenous Australians 'Songlines'. Described by Chatwin (1987, pp 13) "But as long as he stuck to the track, he'd always find people who shared his Dreaming?... From whom he would expect hospitality" Pinterest has created a similar connection on a virtual scale that 'songlines' relate to the connections made through similar interests and that users do not likely stray away from those interests and connections they make or encounter. The virtual 'songlines' are left through 'pins' in this case 'likes' and comments on corresponding interests.

The links made through reality are in turn portayed through a virtual network. With sense of limitations.

References:

Chatwin, B., & Beryl Phillips Indigenous, C. (1998). The songlines. London: Vintage.


Hall, C., & Zarro, M. (2012). Social curation on the website Pinterest.com. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Volume 49(Issue 1), 1-9. Retrieved August 30, 2013, from Online