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Taiwanese Girls' Self-Portraiture on a Social Networking Site

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Taiwanese Girls' Self-Portraiture on a Social Networking Site The London School of Economics and Political Science Taiwanese girls’ self-portraiture on a social networking site Yin-Han Wang A thesis submitted to the Department of Media and Communications of the London School of Economics for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, London. July 2012. Declaration I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the PhD degree of the London School of Economics and Political Science is solely my own work other than where I have clearly indicated that it is the work of others (in which case the extent of any work carried out jointly by me and any other person is clearly identified in it). The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. Quotation from it is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. This thesis may not be reproduced without my prior written consent. I warrant that this authorisation does not, to the best of my belief, infringe the rights of any third party. I declare that my thesis consists of 89,050 words. Statement of use of third party for editorial help I can confirm that my thesis was copy edited for conventions of language, spelling and grammar by Cynthia Little and Jean Morris. 2 Abstract An increasing number of young girls produce contents in social media on a everyday basis for the opportunities to express, explore and connect. Public misunderstanding and concern are about whether girls are being narcissistic and vain. Academic works address how girls exercise agency while negotiating structure in the construction of their gendered adolescent identities. This thesis is situated in relation to our hopes and fears about girls’ self-representation through digital media production, and examines the role that photographic self-portraiture plays in girls’ social relations, personal and gender identity work. The theoretical framework combines the perspectives of gender performativity and symbolic interactionism, supplemented by analyses of personal photography. This thesis chose as its case study the popular Taiwanese social networking site Wretch, and employed a mixed method of quantitative content analysis of 2000 self-portraits of teenagers to understand how they represent themselves, and qualitative online interviews with 42 girls aged 13-20 to learn about their relationships with self-portraiture. The content analysis shows that most teenagers represent themselves in a gender stereotypical manner, while some adopt non gender-specific styles to represent themselves as friendly, suggesting that teenagers may use ideals about femininity, masculinity and sociality as shortcuts to present themselves in a positive light. Interview findings reveal how girls use camera technologies and the affordance of SNS for visual self-disclosure, which is important for the development of their interpersonal relationships. The findings also suggest that self-portraiture is not simply an act of photographing a ‘reality’ of the self, but of formulating self-image(s) and identity in the process of making self-portraits. In self-portraiture, girls are constantly confronted with the ‘who am I’ question, and construct and revise their biographies as they manage an array of audiences from different contexts all collapsing in one space. Furthermore, self- portraiture creates a distance between the ‘I’ and the ‘me’, allowing one to ‘play’ with self-image(s) and identity. It creates a space for the negotiation of ideals and anxieties, for experiments with different subject positions that may be socially or individually rewarding, and it is through these seemingly casual endeavours that one gradually works out their position in the social world. The thesis contributes to the scholarship on girls’ media culture, and suggests current theoretical perspective be expanded in order to better understand different ways of ‘doing girlhood’. 3 Table of Contents DECLARATION 2 ABSTRACT 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS 4 LIST OF TABLES 9 LIST OF FIGURES 10 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 11 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 12 1.1 YOUNG PEOPLE AND SOCIAL MEDIA 12 1.2 A DAY IN THE LIFE 13 1.3 BEYOND THE MORAL PANIC 18 1.4 MEDIA EFFECTS? 23 1.5 EVOLUTION OF THE RESEARCH QUESTION 27 1.6 CONTEXTUALISING PERSONAL PHOTOGRAPHIC PRACTICE 30 1.6.1 Development of personal photographic practice 30 1.6.2 Banal aesthetics 35 1.7 THESIS OUTLINE 38 CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 41 2.1 INTRODUCTION 41 2.2 IDENTITY 42 2.2.1 Psychological perspectives 42 2.2.2 Sociological perspectives 45 2.3 GENDER IDENTITY/SUBJECTIVITY 48 2.4 IDENTITY WORK AND COMPUTER-MEDIATED COMMUNICATION 52 2.4.1 Identity exploration and play 53 2.4.2 Interpersonal communication via social networking sites 55 2.5 UNDERSTANDING CHILDHOOD AGENCY 59 2.6 GIRLS’ MEDIA CULTURE 63 2.6.1 Media consumption and production 63 2.6.2 Play and identity 67 2.6.3 Commercialism and ‘girl power’ 69 4 2.7 RESEARCH QUESTIONS 73 2.8 CONCLUSION 75 CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY 77 3.1 INTRODUCTION 77 3.2 RATIONALE FOR THE METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH 77 3.2.1 From research questions to methodology 77 3.2.2 Complementary use of mixed methods 79 3.2.3 ‘Girl-method’ as a ‘sensitivity’ 81 3.2.4 Operationalising the research questions 83 3.3 RESEARCH DESIGN 85 3.3.1 Quantitative phase: content analysis 85 3.3.2 Qualitative phase: interviews and observation 87 3.3.3 But is she being ‘truthful’? 92 3.3.4 Non-participant observation 93 3.4 DATA COLLECTION METHODS AND PROCEDURES 95 3.4.1 Selection of the field of research 95 3.4.2 Data collection and analysis for Phase 1 96 3.4.3 Participant recruitment for Phase 2 98 3.4.4 Participant briefing and ethics for Phase 2 99 3.4.5 Data collection methods for Phase 2 101 3.4.6 Qualitative data analysis 102 3.5 LEGAL AND ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS 103 3.5.1 Pornographic self-portraits 103 3.5.2 Authorship and privacy protection 104 3.5.3 Illegal or distressing information 105 3.6 METHODOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS ON ONLINE INTERVIEWS 105 3.6.1 Repeat interviews 106 3.6.2 Issues related to IM interviews 106 3.7 CONCLUSION 108 CHAPTER 4 A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF TEENAGERS’ SELF-PORTRAITS 110 4.1 INTRODUCTION 110 4.2 DECODING CONVENTIONAL GENDER REPRESENTATIONS 111 4.3 HYPOTHESES 115 5 4.4 METHOD 116 4.4.1 Coding Instrument 119 4.5 FINDINGS 122 4.5.1 Teenagers’ self-portraits posted in albums 122 4.5.2 Examining teenagers’ profile self-portraits 137 4.5.3 Typology of overall representational style in self-portraits 146 4.5.4 Degrees of variation in each individual’s 10 self-portraits 153 4.6 DISCUSSION 156 4.7 CONCLUSION 160 CHAPTER 5 INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION VIA SELF-PORTRAITURE 162 5.1 INTRODUCTION 162 5.2 COMMUNICATING THROUGH PHOTO-SHARING ONLINE 163 5.3 EVERYDAY ENGAGEMENT WITH CAMERAS, AND PHOTO-SHARING ON WRETCH 167 5.4 CRAFTING THE SPACE: ALBUM CHARACTERISTICS 172 5.4.1 Content 172 5.4.2 Style 175 5.5 SELF-DISCLOSURE VIA PHOTOGRAPHS 179 5.5.1 Social validation 180 5.5.2 Social control 182 5.5.3 Self-clarification 183 5.5.4 Self-expression 184 5.5.5 Relationship development 187 5.6 CONCLUSION 191 CHAPTER 6 SELF-PORTRAITURE AS IDENTITY WORK 193 6.1 INTRODUCTION 193 6.2 SELF-PORTRAITURE. WHY AND WHEN? 194 6.3 ONLINE SELF-PRESENTATION 198 6.4 IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT: BETWEEN THE IDEAL AND THE REAL 200 6.5 IDENTITY EXPERIMENTATION AND EXPLORATION: SELF-PORTRAITURE AS PLAY 206 6.6 EXPOSING THE BACKSTAGE: APPEARING AUTHENTIC 212 6.7 CHANGING AND GROWING UP 215 6 6.8 MANAGING MULTIPLE CONTEXTS AND AUDIENCE 217 6.9 CONCLUSION 222 CHAPTER 7 SELF-PORTRAITURE, FEMININITY AND EMBODIED IDENTITY 225 7.1 INTRODUCTION 225 7.2 GENDER DEMONSTRATED BY THE BODY 226 7.3 CUTE FEMININITY 228 7.4 ‘SEXY BUT NOT SLUTTY’: PRACTICES AND VIEWS ON SEXY SELF-PORTRAITS 234 7.4.1 Views on sexiness 235 7.4.2 A question of taste 238 7.4.3 Practices of sexiness 239 7.5 APPEARING PHOTOGENIC 246 7.6 CONCLUSION 254 CHAPTER 8 CONCLUSION 256 8.1 INTRODUCTION 256 8.2 SUMMARY OF THE EMPIRICAL FINDINGS 256 8.2.1 Photographic self-representation 256 8.2.2 Everyday photographic practice 258 8.2.3 Identity, performance and performativity 260 8.2.4 Self-portraiture as a means of exclusion 264 8.3 THEORETICAL CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE STUDY 266 8.3.1 The (re)presentation of self in computer-mediated communication 267 8.3.2 The use of photographs in interpersonal communication 269 8.3.3 Self-portraiture, girlhood, and girls’ media production 270 8.4 LIMITATIONS OF THE RESEARCH AND METHODOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS 274 8.5 DIRECTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH 275 8.6 CONCLUSION 277 BIBLIOGRAPHY 279 APPENDICES 318 Appendix 1: Content Analysis Coding Protocol 315 Appendix 2: Consent Form for Girls (Age 12-15) 318 Appendix 3: Consent Form for Girls (Age 16-17) 321 7 Appendix 4: Consent Form for Legal Guardian 324 Appendix 5: Pilot Study Interview Topic Guide 327 Appendix 6: Interview Topic Guides 329 Appendix 7: Questionnaire Distributed at Schools 331 Appendix 8: Email Interview 334 Appendix 9: Participants’ Profiles 337 Appendix 10: Coding Frame for the Analysis of Interviews 347 8 List of Tables Table 1 Four positionings of children's agency ........................................................................... 63 Table 2 Operationalisation of the research sub-questions ............................................................ 84 Table 3 Outline of mini-studies ................................................................................................. 116 Table 4 Characteristics of the final sample ................................................................................ 119 Table 5 Mouth area movements (percentages) .......................................................................... 125 Table 6 Facial expression (percentages) .................................................................................... 127 Table 7 Common mouth expressions by facial expressions (percentages) ................................ 128 Table 8 Hand positions/actions (percentages) ........................................................................... 131 Table 9 Body postures (percentages) ........................................................................................
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