Profile of a Social Networker

As a lot of our social interactions take place online nowadays, I think it's fair to say our Facebook profile is our avatar in that world. This identity, like any avatar is a creation, it's not real. As much as we'd like to convince ourselves that what we put on our profile is who we really are, the truth is it's not. How can it be a natural reflection of ourselves when we've had time to critically consider everything that we put down?


There is a social agenda behind the majority of things we write on Facebook. Anything you write can be viewed by everyone in your social network, so why wouldn't you consider your audiences thoughts before writing something. In fact you'd have to be an idiot not to. You cognitively filter out all the things you don't think are appropriate for your social network to see, so what's left is what you want them to see, or don't mind them seeing at least. 


So when asking a friend if they are going out to a club tonight over Facebook, its not just out of curiosity or for logistical reasons it's telling everyone that you have an active social life. When writing that your favourite author is Tolstoy you're not just filling in personal information you're telling everyone you are an intellectual. When your status relates to how drunk you were last night and how drunk you still feel this morning, its not a helpful update of where you are in life its a reminder to everyone that you're a boring douche.


In the real world when someone asks you what your favourite film is, you're put on the spot, your answer will generally be a fairly natural one. On Facebook you are given as much time as you want. You can say whatever you like, that you love David Lynch films, that you feel as if David Lynch was put on this earth to make films solely for you. And you probably wouldn't be held accountable for your choice. You might refuse to watch anything but Michael Bay films, but who's to know?


There is a downside to this world where you can be who you want to be. Like with any discourse what you write is open to interpretation. Writing that you like N-Sync as one of your favourite bands may be seen by you to give of a laid-back doesn't take themselves too seriously easy-going sort of impression, but to David Dub-step you're the definition of a generic crowd following zombie retard. They wouldn't wipe the shit off their shoes with you. What if you put your favourite band as Sally's Heroes, that band that you can't believe no one else has heard of, they've had like 174 views on myspace. To your perceptions you are a cool, ahead of the music game indie music guru but to Terry Top40 you're a pretentious fuck. In the real world you say you like N sync or Sally's heroes, people forget fairly quickly and their overall impression of you tends to be made up of the many other aspects of your personality.


On FB people can over interpret your small selection of 'about me' paragraphs. You may have only put your favourite quote as that one from Forrest Gump because its the only quote you can remember. Doesn't matter. I'll read that and think 'ABSOLUTE TOOL.' In capitol letters and everything.


Is there anything appropriate for Facebook? The thing is with a big enough audience you're bound to have a few fans. So write what you like. I probably won't like it though.

The Sound of My Own Voice

The lack of blog entries recently has been due to the revision period i'm currently going through. It's not that i spend all my time working I just find it hard to justify spending an hour or so writing a blog when i could be writing down notes on speech development in infants, or something equally as interesting

I'll quickly talk about the things I have seen though, I saw Thor and i enjoyed it. I saw The green Hornet, and I didn't enjoy it. I think Seth Rogen is just a bit shit.

I'm always trying to make revision more interesting, this week I've started to record myself presenting the lectures. What i've learnt is firstly, i'm not much of an auditory learner, but secondly that i really enjoy listening to myself speak. That may seem narcissistic, i'll admit there definitely is an element of that but I think mainly it's down to curiosity. I'm listening to a sound that comes from me, a voice that everyone around me hears and associates with me everyday. It's so familiar but at the same time, completely alien.

I know it's me but it feels like listening to someone else and I imagine that the feelings that my voice invoke in me are the same feelings that are invoked in others when they hear me speak. And that a fairly eye-opening, or ear-opening concept. 

I have a soft, thoughtful voice, slightly raspy with a tendency to smack my lips whenever I try and annunciate. My 'ermm's' are more like 'ohhhm's' and I can tell when I'm smiling because the gaps between my words become longer. I'm well spoken, a nod to my secondary education, with a faint hint of Mancunian, a relic from my primary education and the fact that i'm from Manchester I suppose. 

Now that I've finally found my voice, back to the library where I'm encouraged not to use it. Revision awaits.