The main purposes of this book are:
- To allow teenagers
to speak their voice
- To explain teen’s lives on the internet and
social media for people who worry such as parents, teachers, policy makers, etc.
- To explain why social
media has made such a big impact on teenagers’ lives and to challenge adults’
worries about this engagement
The preface begins with Boyd’s interaction with a fifteen-year-old boy named Mike. She explains how he loves watching and making YouTube videos. While Mike and Boyd watch his videos, he asks her to talk to his mother. She thinks everything on the internet is bad, so Boyd agrees to talk to Mike’s mom and explain to her that Mike is not doing anything wrong. Boyd conducted research from 2005 to 2012 by traveling across the United States talking and observing with teenagers. She met with a diverse group of teens with different socioeconomic statuses and ethnicities in many different locations including schools, parks, etc. Boyd interviewed 166 teens between 2007 and 2010 and talked to parents, teachers, etc. to become an expert on youth culture. Also, her previous work with technology, social media specifically, helped her start a conversation with the public and bring attention to the matter at hand. According to Boyd, teens do not get the chance to talk about their lives and networking because people are not willing to listen.
Boyd starts her introduction by talking about an evening in September when she attended a high school football game in Nashville. Boyd talks about a boy named Stan she met three years ago in Iowa and how he said that times have not changed much, contrary to what most people believe. He uses technology references such as changing the font and background to show how little difference high schools are from decades ago to now. Boyd flashes back to the game in Nashville and observes how the students in the stands did not pay much attention to what was going on on the field but rather talked to one another and enjoyed each other’s presence. She notices that the two major changes from the 90s are clothing and cell phone use. Every student had some form of a smartphone, where the white students’ phones seemed to be more expansive than the black students’ phones. All of them, however, were using their phones for the same purposes; they took pictures, went on social media, and showed their friends what was on their screens. If parents called, the teens seemed to be annoyed as the call was unwanted. Boyd compares her generation’s experience with technology to today’s generation. She used it to escape her community whereas today, teens use it to interact and communicate with their community. As blogging became popular, the use shifted from meeting new people with similar interests to talk to friends and familiar people. Social media has become a part of everyday life for teens and will continue to be despite the change in popular apps and technology.
One of the main differences between the way adults and
teens see social media and technology is teenagers focus on how it shapes
publics, whereas adults simply focus on the networking aspect. There are four
affordances that create new opportunities because of these online publics which
are:
- Persistence: social media does not expire, can be kept
as long as wanted
- Visibility: can be seen by broader audiences despite
distance
- Spreadable: easy to repost, copy and paste, etc.
- Searchable: easy access search engines
New technology has always caused
panic among people which is typically seen through a utopian or dystopian
style. Some believe it will fix everything while others think it will ruin everything. Neither of these are correct as technology
has both pros and cons. Adults seem to be more dystopian and believe technology
leads to a decline in their child’s social or cognitive abilities and moral
beliefs. This is false because media tends to exaggerate which makes parents
believe every bad thing that happens online will happen to their kids too.
The “in-between” age of teenagers is a time that they are trying to find themselves and gain independence; one way of doing this is by forming friendships and relationships. This is one of the main reasons why they are so addicted to phones and technology; they need to communicate with their friends. Social media and networking allow teenagers to have an easily accessible and private space. Boyd explains how she talked to Heather, a sixteen-year-old girl, and discovered another reason teens are constantly on their phones. Teenagers have so much to do between school, jobs, family responsibilities, etc. that it can be hard to physically be with their friends. Social media and texting allow them to stay in touch with their friends without having to see them in person. Although this is one way technology is helpful, there are also challenges. These tend to revolve around racial, social, and economic inequality. For example, the quality of phone someone has depends on their financial status. Other problems, such as bullying or sexual predation, are simply magnified by social media rather than caused by it.
The first chapter “Identity” begins by telling the
story of a black man who wrote an essay to a college talking about his struggle
to overcome leaving a gang. They looked at his social media accounts and
realized he had been posting about the gang still and immediately stopped
considering his admission. Boyd, however, took a different approach. She said
how often, teens post content on their social media accounts in order to
survive in the social world; they post for the intended audience. It may be
hard, however, for teens to remember who their audience is. For example, they
may forget about some followers because only certain ones comment on their
pictures. Also, teens struggle with separating who sees what and how their
followers react. For example, Hunter has two different audiences on Facebook;
his ghetto family and his prestigious friends. He says it is frustrating when
his sister comments on posts that are more directed towards his friends.
Psychologist Sherry Turkle focuses on people’s identity through networking. People tend to show themselves as they would like to be seen, rather than how they actually are; however, this can make them a better version of themselves. Online identity has changed as people have profiles that are more realistic compared to people playing games and pretending to be characters in the 90s. Teens may use their real name on FB but create a username that doesn’t include their name at all on Twitter, however, it is just a way to express themselves on different media sites. What they portray themselves as or what they post mainly has to do with the context of the site rather than the site itself. This may or may not correlate with their face-to-face interactions. For example, a girl who likes One Direction does not talk to her friends about it in person because they are not fans. Instead, she talks about it online with other One Direction fans. Also, it is important to note that gaming and characters are still around today where teens create characters based off of themselves such as their avatar resembling aspects of their physical appearance. On the other hand, some teenagers like to be anonymous. While some use this in appropriate ways, many like to escape from adult supervision and feel as if they have some freedom. Some teens make profiles or post content that they think is funny, although not accurate. This may include having a celebrity’s name or a high income. Sociologist Erving Goffman talks about self-presentation and impressions of one another. According to Boyd, “What we convey to others is a matter of what we choose to share in order to make a good impression and also what we unintentionally reveal as a byproduct of who we are and how we react to others” (Boyd, 2015, p. 48). People like to be seen in the best light possible and base what they post off of that. They can also be judged based off of what their friends share or comment on their posts. Because of this judgement, teens struggle with their identity even on the internet. They may still be afraid to say who they truly are, especially those involved in the LGBTQ community.
Boyd, D. (2015). It’s complicated: The social lives of networked teens. Place of publication not identified: Yale University Press.
Whitney Phillips begins by explaining her first time going on 4chan’s website due to her eighteen-year-old brother nagging her. She explains that there was a lot of inappropriate content, and she couldn’t understand why her smart, thoughtful brother thought it was so amusing. She asks him many questions about trolling such as “What do you mean by ‘troll?’ (‘A troll is a person who likes to disrupt stupid conversations on the Internet. They have two basic rules: nothing should be taken seriously, and if it exists, there is porn of it.’)” (Phillips, 2015, p. 1). She became so intrigued with this idea that she did research on it and even wrote a book. Although there are many types of trolls, Phillips focuses on people who identify themselves as trolls and those who take part in the social practices of a troll. She addresses that although trolling happens around the world, she chose to research it in the U.S. and also explains that trolling can be “nasty, outrageous business” (Phillips, 2015, p. 1). Repeating what they say will only encourage them to continue, so examples are only used when necessary.
Phillips shows the relationship between trolling and culture through the story of poor teens using fermented human waste to get high, known as Jenkem. The threads created about this were put onto 4chan by a user named Pickwick with a template for other users to copy and paste. It was written to school principals explaining students’ use of Jenkem. Eventually. Pickwick confessed that it was not real, and he made up the story. This brought attention to many, especially when Fox 30 did a segment on it. Others began falling for this too, mainly parents, and it was considered a successful trolling prank. As many other trolls do, they gave the media a story that they could not resist. This was successful for two reasons; the first being that they chose a drug that has been google searched making it legitimate. The second is members of the community played a part in the story which also made it seem more legitimate. Journalists and news reporters use stories without doing background research because they want to keep their audience interested and meet their deadlines.
There is nothing to show that all trolls have a unified purpose, however, some are politically motivated. Although, it may be unintentional; for example, the jenkem story exposed journalists for not verifying their stories without even trying to do so. Although this may occur, trolls tend to defy typical political action.
Trolls are studied because they draw attention to
culture. According to anthropologist Mary Douglas, dirt can only be seen if cleanliness
has already been determined. This means that trolls’ inappropriate, bad
behavior shows what society’s good and normal behaviors are. The deeper people
look into trolling, however, the harder it is to differentiate between normal
and abnormal.
Phillips’s study first shows the difference between trolls and media; trolls do it for fun whereas media does it for a business. Trolls tend to be more upfront and offensive because they do not have to be censored like the media, but journalists and reporters get paid for essentially trolling. Trolls tend to know a lot when it comes to technology and can compete with those whose jobs involve media. They seem to be the “poster child” for social networking. Lewis Hyde is a writer of a book about the typical trickster who comes up with lies in order to preserve the truth. He writes about a man named Krishna who manipulates many women into having sex with him, then disappears as the sun rises. Gabriella Coleman notes that there are similarities between tricksters and trolls, yet still differences. Trolls are more real and tend to do things for their own amusement whereas tricksters are created as characters. They are the same in the way that they both look for something to manipulate in society and culture, known as cultural digestion. Overall, the book argues that “trolls are born of and embedded within dominant institutions and tropes, which are every bit as damaging as the trolls’ most disruptive behaviors” (Phillips, 2015, p. 1).
Phillips, W. (2015, May 15). Internet Troll
Sub-Culture’s Savage Spoofing of Mainstream Media [Excerpt]. Retrieved from
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/internet-troll-sub-culture-s-savage-spoofing-of-mainstream-media-excerpt/
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