The Presentation of Self in Online Life

Image on flickr by kxande2

I was amazed at how quickly many 23 CPD Thingers posted when Thing 3 was published. This one, for me, is taking some time to work through. The problem lies in how to weigh up the presentation of the polished, professional librarian self and how far to go with the human, haphazard, complex, multi-faceted me. What happens if I change my profession? Something of my online profile will die and need to mutate.

Integral to my brand is the "why" behind my online activities.   This is primarily about a PLN to support me as a lifelong learner.   Interestingly, the Arcadia lecture this week, by Richard  Harper, was about this very subject. He talked about the bonds of work and play, the bonds beyond time and place and communication channels as cultural practice. He discussed the development of mobile phones that enabled others to glance or look at  what the phone owner was doing to see whether they were open to communication or not. Research discovered that people glanced as a way of getting the person being glanced to glance back and thus we have the new social practice of  "glancing".

Erving Goffman talks about "expressive responsibility" in order to avoid unplanned and inappropriate impressions. He sets the individual's performance or brand firmly in the context of  social encounters and societal structures; here we get into the psychology of groups and the way that a social community offers place and support as a protection from doubt, but also as a way of self-deception.

So this brand business is complex!  I guess for me it's OK to have an evolving online persona dependent to some extent on on my competency with the tools and my understanding of digital literacy.  Watch my evolving digital wisdom.