Monday, September 3, 2007

Online hangouts: Teens exploring ID

Most adults know that a lot happens when teens are "hanging out," and all that personal and social development's happening in online hangouts now too. Two researchers supported by the MacArthur Foundation offer insights into what's happening in two such "places" - YouTube and Faraway Lands. In "Self Production and Social Feedback Through Online Video-Sharing on YouTube," psychologist Sonja Baumer describes what went into and came out of a video by 19-year-old "Fatalshade" (her screenname), who grew up on a family farm. Fatalshade "indicates that the video has enabled her to understand the complexity of growing up and confusion around the feelings and desires that teenagers often encounter," Baumer writes. And in "You Have Another World to Create: Teens and Online Hangouts," sociologist C.J. Pascoe describes how one teen, Clarissa, explores identity and role-plays with "friends from all over the world" in her favorite online hangout, Faraway Lands. For more insights and stories - including "Coming of Age in Networked Public Culture," by Heather Horst - see the Digital Youth Research site at University of California, Berkeley.
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2 comments:

  1. CJ PascoeSeptember 3, 2007 at 9:43 AM

    Hi Anne,

    Thank you for aggregating these stories and reports about youth internet use. You might be interested in looking at the larger project of which Dr. Baumer and I are a part - The Digital Youth Project. We have multiple stories about the range of new media use by youth here: http://digitalyouth.ischool.berkeley.edu/stories

    Best,
    CJ Pascoe

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  2. AnonymousJanuary 20, 2008 at 8:24 AM

    Thanks that was interesting. It also strikes me that Fatalshade must have been around four at the time ‘I’m too sexy’ came out - perhaps the similar age to when she started playing with My Little Pony. So these are conflating in her mind as childhood memories. To our eyes, and to her now, they are very different; but perhaps to her at the time, they were all part of her general experience/environment, and the ‘sexual’ aspect of the song just went over her head.
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