Digital Identity - what is it, some views via @mediendidaktik


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Source Ilona Buchem : http://ibuchem.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/digital-identity/

A useful reminder of someone coming in with new eyes and experiences to this wide and wonderfully contentious topic...

A few of his thought-provoking conceptualisations of identity:

  • Social identity is not a fixed possession, but a social process, in which the individual and the social are inextricably related (Jenkins, 1996)
  • Patchwork-identities and identity construction as a dynamic and interactive process of patchworking of different identity components (Keupp, 1999)
  • Changing nature of identity (fluid identity), self-identity including self-reflexivity and creating biographical narratives (project of the self) as an inescapable issue in post-traditional societies (Giddens, 2002)
  • Collective identities as resistance identities, the identity-based social mobilisation in the network society and identities as reflexive achievement in post-traditional societies (Castells, 2006)
  • Identities in “liquid modernity” are negotiated, formed and reformed (Bauman, 2007)
  • really should add Kim Camerons Framework http://www.identityblog.com/stories/2004/12/09/thelaws.html

Some of his favourite conceptualisations of digital identity:

  • Using virtual spaces to construct identity as multiple yet coherent notions with the identity on the computer as sum of the sum of distributed presence (Turkle, 1995)
  • The tripartite play of identities in context of video games: multiple real-life identities, virtual identities and projective identities (as a fusion between game-players and their avatars), as well as  the idea that learning involves taking on and playing with identities (Gee, 2003)
  • Digital identities as data that uniquely describes a person as subject or any other entity, which also includes information about the relationship of the subject to other subjects or entities (Windley, 2005)
  • Identity expression in digital media as part of community involvement, which in itself provides strong incentives for creative expression and active participation in terms of “participatory culture” (Jenkins, 2006)
  • Constructing digital identities as empowerment and personal growth through online self-expression by means of self-publishing, self-reflection, self-documentation (Stern, 2008)
  • Compulsory individuality and regulation of self-expression through consumer culture, exploring the relationship between the structured of consumerism and the agency in terms of the capacity to think and act freely (Willett, 2008)
  • Representations of digital identity as a constant process of negotiation and self-presentation (Boyd, 2004)
  • Digital identity narratives as stories we tell digitally about ourselves to the world linking digital identity to digital storytelling (Koosel, 2011)