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In:The Discursive Construction of Identities On- and Offline: Personal - group - collective
Edited by Birte Bös, Sonja Kleinke, Sandra Mollin and Nuria Hernández
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 78] 2018
► pp. 57–80

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Constructing personal identities online

Self-disclosure in popular blogs

 | University of Helsinki, Finland
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 23 July 2018
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https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.78.03sal
Abstract
The current study aims to discern how identities are built within a sample of ten popular personal blogs and to depict the varieties of identities that emerge. The focus is placed on the diversity of topics disclosed by the bloggers (the breadth of self-disclosure) and the context-bound personal identities that are constructed through this process. The material employs Gee’s (2011) classification of I-statements and Bucholtz and Hall’s (2005, 2008) theorization of interaction and identity. The analysis shows that the topics disclosed in the blogs elucidate facets of online identity supported and created by interaction with the audience, and that a close examination of self-disclosure provides a fruitful approach to studying online identity construction.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Theoretical background and research aims
  • 3.Material
  • 4.Analysis
    • 4.1Breadth of disclosure
    • 4.2Constructing specific identities through self-disclosure
      • 4.2.1Average Girl and a blogger identity
      • 4.2.2Bitchy Waiter and situational identities
      • 4.2.3Pole to Sole and a survivor identity
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
References (50)
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