New Trends in Modern Society: Selfies

The rise of selfies is a rather peculiar cultural phenomenon – it is a form of communication, as well as a method of self-representation. The selfie has become a medium in and of itself, where “the self is the message,” as proposed by Kate Losse (Alang). The aggressive spread of this cultural phenomenon can be attributed to the global increase of camera phones, development of forward-facing cameras, and the growing popularity of social networking and photo sharing sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter, among others. The act of taking and sharing selfies is a modern-day application of Lacan’s “Mirror Stage” as a result of a misrecognition between the realistic image of the selfie-taker, and the selfie that is posted in social media. I will argue that, rather than a symbol of narcissism, selfies are necessary tools of self-exploration and self-representation that have resulted from advancements in technology and the rise of social networking sites.

The phenomenon of selfies has become an art form – a science, to the extent that people have developed guidelines in order to maximize your selfie. The consensus is that the most flattering angle is to hold the phone just above your eye line and tilt the phone 45 degrees. The pose is important too: it is essential to have the perfect head tilt, a casual smile, perhaps some mussed up hair to make the picture more relaxed. Once you have snapped about 57 pictures, it is time to look at your options. If you do not find “the one,” you may find yourself snapping a few more, learning from your mistakes in order to take the perfect picture. After you have taken the perfect picture, it is time to apply the right filter, adjust the contrast, play around with the brightness, smooth over any blemishes, and with a single tap, it is ready to be uploaded to Facebook or Instagram. Now the hard part: time to think of the caption.

The inevitable click of the “share” button is nerve-wracking – you keep reloading the page, waiting to see the likes increase. It is at this point in the sharing process that the cultural anxieties are experienced. Once the picture is posted, the poster will begin a never-ending process of critical examination of the image itself, who liked the picture, how many likes the picture is receiving in comparison to the amount of time that has passed since it was posted, and so forth. The cultural and social anxieties involved with staying relevant and up-to-date amongst our peers are a necessary factor in the creation of our identities on social media.

The meaning and significance that underlies taking selfies is rather peculiar – how did it originate? What factors contributed to its popularity? Why is it still being done today? Regardless of its past, it is undeniable that the selfie phenomenon has caught on, and has taken the world by storm – everyone is doing it, from celebrities to politicians to our own friends and family. It has even reached outer space, with Aki Hoshide’s infamous selfie while conducting extravehicular activity (Day). The notion of taking a photo of oneself has been around for almost 200 years: Robert Cornelius, a pioneer in daguerrotype photography, took a self-portrait of himself outside of his family’s store in Philadelphia in 1839 (Day). Selfies were experimented with by Andy Warhol and others in the 1970s when the Polaroid camera was invented and rose to popularity (Day). Film was expensive; therefore, selfies did not rise to fame until the digital era. Images with the hashtag #selfie began appearing on Flickr as early as 2004. The introduction of the iPhone 4 in 2010, with its front-facing camera, pushed the selfie to the next level – they could now be taken much more easily. Other advancements such as self-timers and selfie sticks have propelled the selfie to a position of popularity that is unprecedented.

The act of taking, posting and sharing selfies has become an integral part of life for those born in Generation Y (Wickel 5). The nature of selfies is a widespread discussion, often debated to extremes –some see them as a symbol of youth, fun, and enthusiasm, yet to others, it is seen as narcissistic and even psychotic. Selfies encourage superficiality and often inspire feelings of self-absorbedness in the viewer. Selfies are seen by many as a manner of recording our lives and what we are doing – if this is true, then why do we feel the need to share them? According to John Paul Titlow, selfie-takers “are seeking some kind of approval from their peers and the larger community, which thanks to the Internet, is now effectively infinite” (Titlow). As humans, we are genetically programmed to be “driven by the need for approval and self-affirmation…The desire for a pictorial representation of the self dates back to early handprint paintings on cave walls more than 4,000 years ago. In a fast-paced world of ever-changing technology, it could be argued that the selfie is simply a natural evolution of those hands dipped in paint” (Day).

The act of taking and sharing selfies is not done for the individual themselves, but rather, for the audience that will eventually view it once it is shared. We have little awareness for or of the audience that is on the other side of our selfies. We take the selfie in order to create a representation of ourselves, yet why do we feel the need to share it for others to see? Selfies play into Mulvey’s notion of voyeurism; most commonly, girls take and post selfies, looking for the approval of males within their social circle. Berger discusses this in the four-part television series Ways of Seeing: “Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at” (qtd. in elena, "Ways of Seeing & Ideal Women in Popular Culture"). We will always be comparing ourselves to others, therefore, can we ever achieve self-satisfaction and self-gratification with the existence of social media?

There is a misrecognition of appearance involved with taking selfies. Lacan’s notion of misrecognition can be applied to the act of taking selfies. The “mirror stage” as discussed by Lacan in “The Mirror Stage as Formative of the I Function” involves a baby’s misrecognition of a whole, coherent self as seen in its reflection. Similar to this, when we look at a selfie we have taken of ourselves, there is a misrecognition between the whole, coherent self in the picture, and our assemblage of disconnected parts that make up our appearance in reality. We rarely look like how we look in selfies. Similar to the “mirror stage,” the act of taking and sharing selfies “establish[es] a relationship between an organism and its reality” (Lacan 78). We aim to maintain our position in our social circle by maintaining our presence on social media.

We are on the constant pursuit for more followers, more likes, more shares, more retweets – this has resulted in cultural and social anxieties that we have become largely unaware of, due to the ubiquitous nature of social media. Have we voluntarily chose to become ignorant of the anxieties that surround is? According to Simon Foxall, "A selfie blurs the line between 'reality' and the performance of a fantasy self, so one collapses into the other” (Day). The misrecognition that is evident between our “real” self and the “ideal” self that we have constructed is effectively masked by the narcissism that is supposedly involved with taking and sharing selfies. The trend of selfies has developed sub-trends including funeral selfies, after-sex selfies, #NoMakeup selfies, the belfie (butt selfie), #IWokeUpLikeThis selfies, and so forth. Our cultural anxieties regarding maintaining our presences on social media have forced us to begin to take selfies anywhere and everywhere, no matter the occasion.

As aforementioned, selfies are considered by many to be direct indicators of narcissism and psychopathy. In this context, narcissism can be defined by the “belief that you’re smarter, more attractive and better than others, but with some underlying insecurity” (Grabmeier). In the context of selfies, they are often posted in order to show people that one is confident in their appearances. Conversely, the feelings involved with taking and posting selfies on social media often mimic anxiety resulting from insecurities that the individual may have. Pictures are well-thought-through, thoroughly analyzed, and perfected to a degree, before they are posted. This does not reflect the “tendency toward impulsive behaviour” as defined in the description of a psychopath provided by Grabmeier. People that post selfies all exhibit a relatively high degree of self-objectification, resulting from the desire to gain likes and followers from the picture posted. After posting a selfie, a person’s self-worth is considerably affected as a result of the number of likes received, tying into the social and cultural anxieties aforementioned.

For many, selfies are a form of self-representation: a manner of constructing one’s identity based on what is posted on an individual’s social media. Selfies are linked to promoting one’s “personal brand” in order to stay relevant and maintain one’s online presence. Part of being human involves “forming and reinforcing our identities by making them visible to others” (Alang). From finger-painted depictions on cave walls, to diaries in the Victorian era, to family portraits, this fact is evident throughout history. Today, we use social media to construct an “ideal self” composed of the societal, cultural, and environmental influences that we perceive to be appropriate and acceptable. We use the platforms of social media to reinforce our identities, to express ourselves, and to update others with the happenings of our lives: “everything from daily routines to…how we dress is part of the ongoing relation between our identities and how we and others see ourselves” (Alang). The evident conjunction between sharing as a means of constructing our self identity begs the question of what motivates people to post selfies as a manner of updating others? When did this begin, and why do we continue to do it?

A heated debate has been sparked regarding the theme of narcissism with regards to taking and posting selfies. I agree with this in many ways. Conversely, could self-confidence be mistaken for narcissism and vanity? Freud’s theory of primary narcissism “is a first state, prior to the constitution of the ego and therefore auto-erotic, through which the infant sees his own person as the object of exclusive love” (qtd. on LacanOnline). From this, we can conclude that it is in our genetic makeup to have some degree of self-love and self-admiration. This begs the question of if it is a bad thing to be proud of one’s appearance. If we begin to change our attitudes towards selfies by recognizing the self-confidence that lies behind them, maybe selfies as a “medium” can be reclaimed and reinvented into an updated cultural phenomenon. Selfies could be transformed into an art form: a sort of portraiture that could apply the ideas of Berger’s project of social and cultural documentary and discussion. Selfies have the potential to be used for social change through empowering movements, such as those discussed by Jes Baker in “Things No One Will Tell Fat Girls.”