Tuesday, June 6, 2017

Selfies

Connections
In this blog post the website http://selfiecity.net/# and Teen Vogue's http://www.teenvogue.com/story/no-selfie-day-self-esteem will be discussed.  In the website selfie city, five different countries were analyzed in the poses and expressions of people in thousands of selfies collected.  In the website demographics are collected showing that more women take selfies than men, specifically in Moscow females are 4.6 times more likely than males to take a selfie.  Overall, taking selfies is considered a thing that young people do, which is true based on the information from the website.  However, in every city the data shows that more older then (30) post more selfies.  Smiles and expressions were also analyzed; most selfies are of people smiling but in Moscow people smile the least.  I believe that selfies do matter and they mean something.  Personally, I don't really take selfies or even post them on social media but when I do I find myself to over analyze the picture to make sure everything looks good.  I feel like this is the problem with taking selfies especially too many.  Teenagers spend hours on their phones looking at other people's selfies and possibly comparing themselves to others.  Social media reinforces the dominant ideology that Grinner discussed in explaining SCWAMP (straight, christian, white, able-bodies, male, property holder).  We are able to identify the dominant ideologies today and teenagers are the forefront to picking out what is accepted and normal.

Teen Vogue's article on "No Selfies Day" and why you should participate discusses the word selfie as the "word of our generation".  Everyone takes selfies and theres even a song about it but what is shocking is that the average girl spends 1 hour and 24 minutes preparing for selfies each week.  I remember being in high school and putting on makeup and trying on clothes just to take a selfie.  Within taking selfies there is a need to feel noticed and to get positive feedback.  Today, access is unbelievably rapid with front facing cameras, editing, and filters.  By the end of the editing process, the selfie that is about to be posted doesn't even look like the person who took it.  Being a teenager is about "becoming".  As Raby discussed in “A Tangle of Discourses” (2002), becoming is about self discovery and forming an identity. If teens are spending so much time taking and editing selfies and worried about what others are thinking are they really forming their true identity or just molding into what society wants? The discourse of teens being "at risk" relates to the idea that selfies can be influential, negatively. Teens are more at risk to eating disorders but why is this? Is it the comparison of selfies? With anything that is posted on social media there will always be negative feedback and someone who spent an hour editing a selfie gets negative comments will think "that wasn't enough editing" or "I'm not pretty enough".

My question is; What are we getting from taking selfies and is it really worth it?

2 comments:

  1. Lexi, I love your final question. I also love that you asked about eating disorders, and if selfie culture could possibly affect those. That's really interesting to think about. Great post!

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  2. Great post Lexi! I agree, the discourses about teens being "at risk" allows selfies to become a negative thing to society. Teens are stigmatized in the eyes of society and adults who are not willing to understand them. I love how you mentioned SCWAAMP, because it double jeopardizes teens, especially females and minorities. In this way, everything associated with teens becomes negative, even something simple as a selfie.

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