What a great way to start the week: I found a copy of the „Companion to New Media Dynamics“ on my desk, to which I contributed a chapter on „networked identity“. Given the limited space (~10 pages), I present only some basic concepts and ideas. My main point: „Identity“, online as well as offline, is always performed, so when looking at digital media we have to examine specific practices of networked identity – that is, how people perform and (re-)produce aspects of their identity in particular situations, framed, guided and sometimes constrained by technological affordances (code), shared routines, norms and expectations (rules) and the social ties as well as textual connections (e.g. articulated networks of contacts on an SNS) within their practices are situated.
While I haven’t had the time to read them yet, it seems that the contributions by Theresa Senft („Microcelebrity and the branded self“) and Alice Marwick („Online Identity“) provide interesting other angles, so in sum our three texts should give a pretty good picture on dynamics of online identity. And there is more: The companion’s editors John Hartley, Axel Bruns and Jean Burgess did a great job compiling more than 30 texts on various aspects of, well, new media dynamics. You can find more information on the volume here, and Axel is providing some additional information on his blog.
Schmidt, Jan-Hinrik (2013): Practices of Networked Identity. In: Hartley, John / Jean Burgess / Axel Bruns (Hrsg.): A Companion to New Media Dynamics. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. S. 365-374.