Social Media and Identity Formation

This assignment delves into the complex relationship between social media and identity construction. It examines how users curate online personas through impression management techniques and engage in selective connections with like-minded individuals (homophily). The analysis also considers the role of social media in the spread of hate speech and explores methods for its detection. Drawing on various academic sources, students are expected to critically evaluate the multifaceted influence of social media platforms on individual identity development.

Running head: MEDIA
Media
Student Name
University name
Author Note

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1. Yes someone can change his or her identity through performance. Identity performance is
our process of expressing ourselves to others through cloths, speech, facial expression
and movements (Wittkower, 2014). With the revolution of social media identity
performance through impression management has found many other ways (Paliszkiewicz
& Mądra-sawicka, 2016). Their performance on the social media can create their identity.
However there are challenges because through the digital medium the identity that
someone is trying to build might get misinterpreted. For example a man through his
performance on the digital platform might build up an identity of a woman. In recent
times the transformation of Caitlyn Jenner can be good example of how not just gender
transformation but also her performance on social media established her identity
(Caldwell, 2016).
2. Homophily is human’s tendency to associate themselves with the people of similar
attitudes, interests, values, personality and background (Cook, 2014). The effect of peers
has great influence over the people who belong to modern generation. The people show
the signs of mirroring more than ever, where they are mimicking movements, vernacular
and behavior of others knowingly or unknowingly. One good instance where homophily
can have good impact is quitting smoking. Research has demonstrated that quitting
smoking is more effective if that is initiated within a group (Hitchman et al., 2014). If a
friend shows strong will to quit smoking that positively impact on the other friends too.
On the other hand there are instances where homophily affects people negatively like in
health related issues. If one’s friend gains weight his perspective towards heavy people is

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more likely to be changed and gaining weight becomes more socially acceptable for him
(Huffingtonpost.com, 2011).
3. Hate speech can be defined as a communication that expresses only hatred towards
certain groups or communities and generally intended to provoke violence. Most hate
speech is comprised of racial, religious or ethnic commentaries to offend the addressed
communities (Waseem & Hovy, 2016). Some hate speech aim to threat, insult, terrorize,
degrade and attack individuals and therefore it is different from regular speech. If the hate
speech is intended to hurt someone it should be punishable by law. On the other hand
when freedom of speech is concerned there is a scope of further consideration and
discussion (Djuric et al., 2015). The area of offense is quite complicated as certain speech
may hurt certain segments of society but it might not actually be hate speech. However
every person has a freedom of voice but as hate speech offends or hurts people it must be
treated differently.
4. The cultural capital makes use of the non-economic resources in order to enable the
social mobility of the people. It includes the knowledge and the skills, which helps in
building the best part of the social structure. Social networks are being adhered to by the
cultural capital as a base for linking the likeminded people of the organization (Yang, Liu
& Wei, 2016). The economic capital, on the other hand, depends on the monetary
transactions that is undertaken in order to understand the exchange value of the
commodities that are being purchased. The social capital makes use of the networks of

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the relationships among the people thereby helping the society to understand and the
effective functioning of the society. The social networks help in the integration of the
ideas, which enables the society to function as per the requirements of the inhabitants of
the particular society. The functions of the SNS help in undertaking the basics of the
networking and thereby help in making the society strong. The inclusion of the cultural
and the social capital packed with the economic resources helps in the proper functioning
of the society. The Social media networking helps in the making the society strong and
educated at the same time.
5. At times, a person suffering from headache might not work out as the consequences that
the person might face as a result of a chronic headache is huge, thereby hampering the
working schedule and the dependence on the factors of the process. in order to
understand the nature of the headache, as to the tenacity of the headache or the timeliness
helps in determining the majority of the headache. The headache that is being suffered by
the person must be assessed according to the particular time in which it inflicts its blow
on the person or the feeble condition the person is subjected to at the time of the
headache. Determining the following factors can be helpful in understanding the nature
and the necessity of classifying the headache under the chronic or the general backdrop.
6. This year in June, Canada experienced a social media controversy about race
discrimination. The controversy started after Annie Villeneuve’s road show at St. Fete
nationale parade in Montreal on 24th June (Montrealgazette.com, 2017). A video posted
on Facebook showed that Villeneuve’s float is being pushed by all people of color and
behind the float a group of choir members wearing all white. The video was shared more

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than 12000 times within a day and received thousands of comments (Ctvnews.ca,
2017).Though the boys who were pushing the float are students of local school and
athletic team and belong to diverse ethnic group. Though the organizers apologized but
claimed to be an anti racist group and experienced great trouble because of the
controversy over social media.
7. Five female celebrities on social media are Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj, Ellen DeGeneres,
Lady Gaga and Beyonce and five male celebrities on social media are Justin Bieber,
Cristiano Ronaldo, Barack Obama, Will Smith and Dwayane Johnson. The selected
celebrities are few of the most famous celebrities online so they all have millions have
followers on the platform. For the female celebrities it is generally noticed that most
comments are from male members and it is also noticeable that female celebrities tend to
respond more often than the male celebrities. The female celebrities try to connect with
their followers more than the male celebrities. Male celebrities on the other hand react
towards politics more than females. I think it is the individual identity performance
through managing their impressions.
8. No it is not okay for a single platform to have monopoly. Companies like Facebook or
Google control most of the market and acts like new masters of the global economy.
Facebook and Google both connect to its users, developers and advertisers. Google rules
the search engines and Facebook controls the social media. Though the differences do not
matter when monopoly is concerned. The monopoly of such business giants does not

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allow any competitors so other companies struggle to exist (Baran, Fietkiewicz & Stock,
2015). Their dominance is evident if one follows how Facebbok changed the business of
WhatsApp and Instagram. Apart from gobbling up smaller organizations the companies
possessing monopoly power have other negative impacts as well, like inequality in wages
and weakening private investment.
9. The problems faced by the homogenous people in accordance to the other heterogeneous
people can be enumerated in the following ways. The basic differentiation is being based
on the preference of the people and thereby affects the sociable nature of the homogenous
people. In a biased social structure the homogenous people gets a very few advantage of
socializing effectively (Phillips, 2014). The society being biased keeps the people away
from the social structure. In a society that has already accepted the homogenous nature
of the certain people are privileged enough to affirm their preferences and mingle
indifferently with the people at large. Human beings are sociable beings, living in the
society. The reforms in the society has brought about a change in the probable cases of
the homogenous people, but in certain underdeveloped or developing regions, the
practices to keep the homogenous people are prevalent.
10. Different kind of network power exists in a network like the Networking power,
Network power, Networked power, Network making power and Counter power. Social
network is also a structure consists of social actors that can be both individuals and
organizations (Westaby, Pfaff & Redding, 2014). Networking power can be influenced

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by certain social influences, for example in Western society the social media is part of
daily life more than Asian society. Platforms like Facebook or Google acts as the
dominant actors on the digital networking. The network structure provides the various
actors with various roles and responsibilities and by applying certain strategies they
achieve their desired goals.
11. Social Networking Sites are basically platforms like Facebook or Twitter brings people of
similar interests together. The social media helps everyone to gather information about
others and according to those they build up relevant relationships. The awareness about
the social issues or advancements is shared with others easily through social network. On
the other side, the personal information available on Facebook can be used against social
relationships (Ellison et al., 2014). However social network can successfully builds social
capital through the connection, bonding and relationship it offers. Like on Facebook the
relationship generally gets established among people who know each other in real life but
on Twitter more number of people gets connected to each other even when they are
lacking any existing connections.

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Reference
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