New Concepts to Everyday Life: Social Networking Sites

Social networking sites can be considered a form of virtual community with 4.48 billion users as of July 2021. Social networking sites have large impacts on people's lives in the current, modern-day world. This includes sociological impacts where our communication, relationships, and interactions with others in everyday life are influenced by social networking. The rapid expansion of the internet today brings people together, regardless of culture or geographical position. This contrasts to previously where access to knowledge was only available to those of a specific class, gender, or culture showing how social networking sites have extended the level of knowledge most of us have today. However, these sociological impacts of social networking sites can be dangerous and larger than first imagined. Social networking sites have almost completely removed the dividing line between people's public and private lives. Overall, the internet has provided a network where people can carry out anonymous social interactions, leaving us questioning the differences between real and fake identities.

Goffman's concepts

Goffman's concepts (1959) suggest that certain information is given off by people, resulting in them creating their own image and impression in front of others. Goffman (1959) also refers to the presentation of self and impression management as a key concept, where we aim to influence people's perception of a situation and where people want to be well thought of by others, so carry out subtle actions to try and seek approval. This is linked with the social networking sites perspective where people choose certain information to upload to blogs or pages to form their identity and image in front of others (Phillipson et al. 2004). Goffman's (1959) idea of frontstage and backstage is particularly important regarding social networking sites where we can understand social media as a ‘performance’. This could refer to when people upload deliberate information on social networking sites that do not necessarily present them as accurately as it could, therefore linking to a performance that is ‘put on’ to self-represent themselves as positively as possible. People continue to step in and out of character and performance on the internet which mimics social interactions and performances in the real world. Alternatively, Erving Goffman's (1959) concept of ‘frontstage’ and ‘backstage’ are almost completely taken away when it comes to social networking sites and the presence of the internet. This is supported by the fact that post-modernism now sees people sharing more personal information and details about their lives on vlogs and blogs, such as YouTube. Thus, linked to the growth and expansion of mass media and a freer movement of people, and the formation of new multicultural societies. This is also reinforced by the media's fascination with the personal lives of celebrities and making this a norm or habit in society to be ‘expected’ to share private information. Meanwhile, this can also be a way of creating an identity by making your private issues public to tell ‘friends’ more about you in the hope people will think highly of you. However, a criticism of this argument of social networking sites blurring our private and public lives is that we can obviously still decide how much of our life we want to make public, regardless of if it is a societal norm or not. No one is told to post personal information online, it has just become a common everyday activity carried out by most of us.

Turkle's concepts

Turkle (1996) introduces the idea that a new sense of identity is emerging along with the internet. As Turkle (1996, p.9) argues, it ‘links millions of people in new spaces that are changing the way we think’ our very identities.' This can be seen as a part of our new everyday lives where we are learning to live in the virtual world where ‘you are who you pretend to be’ (p.12). As users of social networking sites participate, they construct a new version of themself through online social interactions, linking to impression management because anyone can influence people's perception of them by giving off certain information. This links to Turkle's (1996) concept that people can create their lives through social networking sites such as Instagram and Facebook, rather than having to base their identity off their own lived, everyday experiences. This highlights Turkle's idea of social interactions being anonymous on the internet which can be associated with the everyday dangers of social networking sites where people must be careful in determining whether someone's online identity is real, and what their intentions may be. ‘We have learned to take things at interface value’ (Turkle, 1996, p.23) reinforces his previous idea of anonymous social interaction online where interface value means we now question whether someone's online presence is real or fake instead of taking a profile at face value for example and trusting the information they have given off about themselves. Inevitably, this alters our experiences of everyday life where communication and interactions with others are no longer face-to-face, underpinning a dramatic change in our everyday routine where performances are instead carried out online via social networking sites.

Another theme highlighted by Larry (2007) in the sociological discussion of social networking is how in-person sociality cannot be reflected by virtual reality. His ideas present social networking sites poorly as a form of meaningful communication and interaction. This can be suggested when he says ‘primary relationships exist with people with whom we have regular face-to-face and often intimate relations’ (Larry, 2007, p.107). This indicates that our personality and true character are only brought out in interactions that are based on trust and personal involvement in real life, so how can a virtual interaction reflect our in-person social interaction.

Conclusion 

Finally, social networking sites and the internet have introduced brand new concepts to everyday life and how we interact and communicate with each other. This is true for the continuous changes in the language we are now experiencing due to the development of new verbs and specialist languages such as ‘google’, ‘tweet’, ‘message’ and new terms such as ‘viral’, ‘trending’, and ‘online’. This links with my own personal experience as I personally use this vocabulary in my everyday life without thinking.