You Are What You Pin: An Analysis on Pinterest Identity

Below is the link to my final paper.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByE7tud1xQwBM3duYW1HRlRTVTA/edit?usp=sharing

P.S. Sorry about the screenshots from the survey. They are getting messed up when the .pdf is uploading to Google Docs, and I'm not sure how to fix it. Here are the links to the pinboards if you would like to look at them.

Extroverted
Introverted
Sensing
Intuition
Feeling
Thinking
Prospecting
Judging

Girl Wide Web 2.0: A Look into Digital Identity

I want to continuing exploring identity, so for my book I chose Girl Wide Web 2.0: Revisiting Girls, the Internet, and the Negotiation of Identity. I'm hoping this book can explain more about how digital identity varies from different cultures and locations.

Preview

Through the preview of the book, it looks like the book does spend some time defining the differences in which girls determine their digital identities, but it also looks like it spends some time with some of the methods that are used online, such as MySpace and fangirl websites. It seems to spend a lot of time on the online communities that girls participate in, which is helpful for defining their identities.

Early Social Proof

No one responded to my update on Twitter. I was unsuccessful doing searching for conversations about the book as well. I'm going to try to reach out to one of the contributors of the book, because it looks like several of them are on Twitter. We'll see how that goes.

Similar Books

Instant Identity (Mediated Youth) by Shayla Thiel Stern
Growing Up Girls: Popular Culture by Sharon R Mazzarella
Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World by Don Tapscott

It looks like these books are pretty similar in their intent except for the last one Grown Up Digital. This one's intent lies more along the lines of how digital culture is changing and how the "net generation" is changing it.

Digital Portfolios

Last week I posted on Google+ about digital portfolios while I was trying to put my own digital portfolio together. Dr. Burton suggested that I follow up on how common they are becoming.

The first thing I did was search to see exactly what is out there when it comes to digital portfolios. Off the bat, I found that there were two main groups using digital portfolios: artists or photographers and students. The artists and photographers are kind of self-explanatory; it's an easy way to display their work. But the students using these digital portfolios are of all ages, elementary- to college-aged students.

There are tons of sites (and tons of pins on Pinterest) dedicated to setting up digital portfolios for kids, which really surprised me. These kids are already dealing with digital portfolios and will probably be mostly using the digital medium as means for applying for jobs in the future. That's how fast this is catching on.

While continuing my research, I came across a video blog that demonstrates how to make a digital portfolio using PowerPoint, which I wouldn't have even thought to do. It's a cool idea if you are considering a way to make your digital portfolio. However, there are websites or apps, such as Weebly or Deviantart, you can use as well, which is how I created my digital portfolio. (If you want to check it out, click here.)

So, what's the big deal? Why are portfolios switching from print or physical copies to digital? Well, for one, it's convenient. If it's on a website, it's really easy to update. For employers, it's easy to keep track of and it doesn't take up a lot of space. Most importantly, perhaps, is that it shows employers that you are tech savvy.

What do you think about digital portfolios? Do you think they are just another way to showcase skills to an employer, or are they more than that? Do you think it's a good idea that kids are starting to incorporate these in their curriculum at such an early age?

Don Yer Blubber, Land Lubber!

Today, I want to talk about blubber. In class, we discussed the idea of varying degrees of symbolic and/or narrative usefulness within certain sections of Melville's Moby Dick. One particular topic that came up over the course of the discussion was blubber, and I think we were maybe too quick in asserting that there is nothing to be learned from whale fat.

Creative Commons License, by Jenny Spadafora

In Ch. 68, Melville, discussing blubber, writes:

[H]erein we see the rare virtue of a strong individual vitality, and the rare virtue of thick walls, and the rare virtue of interior spaciousness. Oh, man! admire and model thyself after the whale! Do thou, too, remain warm among ice. Do thou, too, live in this world without being of it.

This principle of maintaining a so-called "interior spaciousness"--a personal identity or "room of one's own"--proves particularly important within the context of the modern age. A study presented by Katie Davis in "Young People’s Digital Lives: The Impact of Interpersonal Relationships and Digital Media Use on Adolescents’ Sense of Identity" suggest that identity exploration and use of social media have both direct and indirect negative effects on adolescents' "self-concept clarity." The distillation of that is that as they use digital media exploratively, adolescents (and I would guess this could be extended at least marginally to adults as well) lose a sense of personal identity or rather lose clarity in their understanding of the concept of self.