All the world’s a stage...

See my latest blog below (soon to go live at http://www.cemp.ac.uk/). Feel free to leave a comment, look forward to hearing your thoughts.

It is no new concept that people play different ‘parts’ during their lives, both physical and self-constructed. In a virtual world you can alter your style of being or indulge in experimentation with your identity changing your age, physical appearance, personality, history and even gender. But why is this so appealing to us?

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.
(William Shakespeare, All the World’s a Stage from As You Like It (http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/life/lifesubj+1.html)

As Shakespeare poetically illustrates, people go through the same physical stages of life; infancy, childhood, adolescence and adulthood. Throughout these phases, they constantly change and recreate themselves as a result of nurture, life experience, others around them and aspirations for who they want to be.

As actors in our own life stories, how and why do we create ‘new’ selves scene by scene and with today’s plethora of social media networks, how does the internet play a role in this development?

Key terms
Online identity, presentation of self, control, social media, virtual worlds

Identity, the internet and virtual worlds
Identity has been suggested to be something which we are continually building and reforming, a presentation of self as who we think we are and how we want others to view us. Cultural studies expert Jeffrey Weeks and social theorist Anthony Giddens have commented that identity is a ‘necessary fiction’ or ‘project of self’. According to Thurlow (2004), identity is a way of trying to make sense of the chaos and variety in our lives, helping us to organise our different feelings, ideas, beliefs, attitudes and values. The internet allows people to control which of these they make available to others and the narrative they choose to tell.

Back in October I wrote a pretty damning and somewhat unreflective blog (http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/what-is-the-virtual-world-coming-to) about the idea of Second Life. Having actually never tried using it, I could not criticise its merit as a program but rather the idea of somebody posing as a completely different person, with a different life, identity and even gender. However, the more I have thought about the convergence of online and offline life along with the concept of self-constructed multiple personalities, the more I too have to question whether a virtual identity is in fact any less ‘real’ than a physical identity. Both are coherent stories which belong to us and as this article will go on to discuss; if anything a ‘second’ online identity may actually be more of an accurate representation of who a person really is compared to what they present to people in the physical world.

Anonymity
The web gives people the power to explore alternative identities as opposed to just existing as an ‘authentic self’. In the real world, people are more constrained by social norms and regulations dictating how they must or are expected to act in certain situations. Online they have more control.

For this reason amongst others, it is suggested that ‘Anonymity is part of the magic’ (Myers, 1987). Myers discussed how reduced cues open up the potential for identity play. Fast-forward 22 years from when this comment was made and it is clear that the internet provides the ideal arena in which to do this.

Existing both in the physical world and online, people are able to divorce their bodies from time and space in an open realm. The internet can therefore allow people to be more honest and open to self-disclosure as well as being more true to their embodied selves than they would actually let themselves be in the physical world (McKenna and Bargh; Bargh et al. 2002). This could be said to be one reason why people choose to exist in second worlds (i.e. Second Life, World of Warcraft, Habbo), as well as participating in forums and chat rooms, as it enables them to explore identities and be someone who the physical world may not allow them to be.

The rise of social networks and its impact in the physical world
My first blog was quite dismissive in that I suggested there is simply not enough time in any one day to spend large proportions of it in a second world and that the proportion of time spent online must have a detrimental effect on a person’s physical life. In line with my viewpoint, there are critics who also suggest that online life lessens the quality of offline life. However, the more I read around this subject, the more I consider the alternative view from critics such as Wellman and Gulia (1999) that the internet is integrated in to physical life therefore extending and complementing the sociability people maintain offline.

A blog (http://interactive.hotwirepr.com/2009/03/13/the-rise-of-social-networks/) by Annie W, Hotwire PR (http://www.hotwirepr.com/), mentions that according to research from Nielsen (http://www.nielsen-online.com/pr/pr_090309.pdf),

“Social networks and blogs are now the fourth most popular online activity, ahead of email and are visited by 67% of the global online population... time spent on these sites is growing three times faster than overall internet rate and accounts for almost 10 percent of our time spent online.”

This demonstrates how pervasive social networking has become. Having the facility to be connected to people around the world, 24 hours a day everyday is changing how we communicate, share information and learn from others.

In comparison, an article (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/15/magazine/15wwln-lede-t.html?_r=1) in The New York Times Magazine by Peggy Orenstein suggests that too much time spent online has negative implications for our transitions from childhood, adolescence and young adulthood in to life as young professionals and late adulthood.

As another article (http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/cancerbook) explored, does the fact that the internet and social media have become engrained in our everyday lives, or possibly more importantly young children’s lives, have detrimental consequences on our health and physical social interaction? Orenstein expresses concerns about our time spent on the internet causing us to miss out on some of the experiences which older generations had; inventing games to play on the street, building things from scratch, spending time communicating face-to-face with friends and family, things which in her opinion could be argued to be vital to growth and personal development. She also expressed concern about not being able to grow through times of loneliness for example, because there’s always someone you can text, email, ‘Tweet’ to or ‘Facebook’.

Orenstein’s piece also touches upon the notion of personal reinvention, leaving old identities behind at each stage of life. From this point of view the internet could be argued to inhibit identity formulation with past identities; photographs, blogs, opinions, existent in cyberspace for years to come available for all to see. Do we really want embarrassing photos of how we were at school to be dragged up ten years later when we are beginning to or have succeeded in building our ‘ideal’ identity, which we present to the world. In times gone by, people could re-invent themselves at different stages of their lives, choosing what information about their pasts they revealed to others. Do we have that same privilege? It seems nowadays people are forced to reminisce whether they choose to or not.

Upon reflection of these points, it is clear that the issue exists as to whether the internet will hinder or foster social interaction, expression and new forms of identity (Lievrouw and Livingstone, 2006). This leads me on to discuss whether the internet can also be said to cause identity crises.

Identity crisis
Psychoanalyst, Erik Erikson developed a theory that identity crisis is a normal stage of ego development in late adolescence and early childhood that may lead to different outcomes. He said that, 'Some individuals uncritically adopt identities derived from their parents, others endlessly experiment with different identities' (a process Erikson refers to as ‘moratorium’) 'sometimes failing to emerge with any coherent identity’ (a process he refers to as ‘diffused identity’).

Children spontaneously like certain things and dislike others but do not construct identities around them (Baumeister, 1986: 192). When children grow to school age, their likes and dislikes lose their innocence. Liking unfashionable toys, making friends with unpopular children, wearing old fashioned shoes become tied to image and identity. By early adolescence, many if not all choices become tainted by image-consciousness (Gabriel and Lang, 2007).

Today’s consumers are preoccupied with identity. Much time is spent assessing the authenticity of an individual’s persona and whether it is recognised as authentic to others (Gabriel and Lang, 2007). People in today’s world also seem occupied with scrutinising others in an attempt to identify who they are and what they aspire to be. Have you ever experienced envy when looking at a friend’s profile on Facebook because of the clothes they’re wearing, the way they have their make-up and how much fun they appear to be having? Or have you seen a Tweet on Twitter which was either witty or highly intuitive, subsequently making you feel inferior?

Identity is no mere life story but a life story that commands attention, respect and emotion from others. Extending an idea from Gidden (1991) of identity as narrative, we would see identity not merely as the story of who we are, but also a fantasy of what we wish to be like. Through presenting ourselves and our personalities, ideas and opinions online, could it be said that we endeavour to compete with others, both those that we know only in the online world and those we know offline?

Facebook? What a load of Twitter!
So, why is it that we feel the need to present ourselves using so many outlets? For example, clinical psychologist Oliver James says that “Twittering stems from a lack of identity. It’s a constant update of who you are, what you are, where you are. Nobody would Twitter if they had a strong sense of identity.” Does this mean that we feel the need to seek approval for our every action, a need to constantly be connected to others? Is it the fear of not being kept ‘in the loop’? Or is it more to do with who we know will see us on there and subsequently what they think of us as a character by what photos we upload or the intelligent or witty things we ‘Tweet’? Why do we feel that we need to update the world on so much these days?

Has this culture of voyeurism which we have created for ourselves made us so unsure of who we are that we search desperately for some kind of sustainable identity, or has it just opened up an arena in which to thoroughly explore ourselves, to develop as individuals so that we are one day able to achieve our true state of being?

I personally feel it's more of the former. Despite the fact that you can learn so much from people you communicate with on the internet, I see it that people go online more to keep up with the rat race, present themselves to the world in a certain way and to sometimes escape from physical reality. But wait, don't we do that in the physical world too...?

Related topics and other useful places to look:
Online identity lecture from Bournemouth University(http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/the-internet-and-the-inferno)

Online Identity, Wikipedia
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_identity)

Media and Participation 09, Bournemouth University, Here (http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/media-participation-2009-session-one) and Here (http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/wiki/index.php?title=Media_and_Participation_09_Session_One#Multiplicity_of_Identity)

Hair straighteners, social media and the Christmas closure of three pub (http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/hair-straighteners-social-media-and-the-christmas-closure-of-three-pubs)

We can all be Rosie
(http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/online-trolling-aka-rosie)

The Unmanageable Online Consumer
(http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/the-unmanageable-online-conusmer)

Mike’s (lecturer at Bournemouth University) discussion about Play and Consumer behaviour
(http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/play-and-consumer-behaviour)

Digital Virtual Consumption (Mike Molesworth, Bournemouth University)
(http://www.cemp.ac.uk/communities/interactivemedia/interactivemedia/re-enchantment-and-exploitation-in-digital-virtual-consumption)

Extra notes:
For academic references see article on http://www.cemp.ac.uk/ when published.

CEMP is a research and innovation centre based in the Media School at Bournemouth University. It was awarded its status in 2004 by the Higher Education Funding Council for England and is the only HEFCE-funded centre for excellence in media in the UK.