Self-Presentation Online

Abstract

The previous chapter suggests that friendship has become a powerful emblem of interpersonal democratisation during late modernity. ‘Friendship’, as an idea and set of practices, is used to navigate both intimate and casual ties in the framework of increasingly diverse channels of communication. Social network sites have further reconfigured the apparent flexibility, informality and conviviality of friendship through the public display of personal connections. The type of social media engagement articulated on social network sites promotes a new form of friendship administration (Ellison et al. 2011b). This chapter explores the ways people are managing their personal connections online within personalised networked publics by investigating the ways in which sites are used by participants to present the self. It considers the techniques available to users for managing the public display of the personal and to navigate the uncertain and often risky boundaries between ‘personal’ and ‘public’.