In the twenty-first century, digital technology is a powerful influence in terms of identity formation. Rather than a concrete geographical location determining one’s identity, it is a performance that is also algorithmically distributed in digital spaces. Rather than self-presentation, performativity, or digital surveillance theories merely being useful in understanding identity formation in digital society, they require a question of critical examination in terms of experience.
Erving Goffman’s original work in relation to self as presentation is his work of 1959, and it is a crucial building block of digital identity. In essence, social interaction is a performance and a form of impression management, as proposed by Goffman. But in terms of social networks such as Instagram or TikTok, one’s identity is effectively an endless form of public performance, as proposed by Hogan (2010).
Sherry Turkle’s “networked self” (2011) carries this conversation further in terms of multiplicity and fragmentation. In cyberspace, one has the ability to experiment with multiple identities within the websites, and at times, even simultaneously. This freedom has allowed me, as an individual, to experiment with my creative sides of identity that need not conform to pre-defined expectations of my offline existence. Nevertheless, as Turkle points out, this continuous shifting attributefully leads “to a state of emotional dissonance, which is a state of being ‘alone together’”.
From my use of social networks myself, I understand that a particular impression in a particular forum is one thing compared to a relationship with a particular individual in a particular context, as it furthers illustrates that Goffman’s theory is ever-relevant. Nonetheless, it was originally proposed in terms of physical social interactions and therefore offers nothing in terms of an algorithmically organized reality in which one’s identity is created through invisible technological power.
Nevertheless, Zuboff’s surveillance capitalism offers a more critical perspective in this regard. Each of our online activities—liking, searching, buying—is constantly harvested for data, fueling algorithmic profiles that predict our actions as well as our appearances. I examine my own engagements with online streamers and targeted advertisements in particular, realizing that my digital self is not entirely mine to control. Zuboff’s assertion is thus pertinent in that digital identity is not merely enacted but is also a product of its commercialized market. Problems of autonomy and authenticity lie at such an intersection that a sociological theory of old could never have projected. Various sociological theories of identity formation—ranging from dramaturgical performances of identity byGoffman to digital identities of Turkle and data-mined identities of Zuboff—of course all have their validity but partially so in understanding a more redundant whole in becoming a digital self. My engagement with digital technology itself points to a complex intercession of digital identity as an act of assimilation of a self that is simultaneously enacted and extracted in a corporate setting that is a performance stage in its own right. Self-criticism is thus engendered through an increased consciousness in one’s interaction with technology in such a digital setting. In a digital setting, one’s identity is not merely constructed but is also codetermined together with digital users, algorithms, and audiences.
References
Goffman, E. (1959) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Doubleday.
Hogan, B. (2010) ‘The presentation of self in the age of social media: Distinguishing performances and exhibitions online’, Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, 30(6)
Turkle, S. (2011) Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. New York: Basic Books.
Zuboff, S. (2019) The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. London: Profile Books.
