Gender Performance and Technology

Although I don't want to delve too much into gender issues and technology in my project (because seriously that's a whole other issue) a couple do mention these issues in my interviews with them. One of my friends talks about her relations with the opposite sex and how that alters her use of technology, while another friend discusses actual gender identities and how technology can make these identities very two dimensional, black and white.

The following youtube video is a combination of these two interviews that briefly touch upon these gender issues.



Although what Haley says is very interesting it is a little off topic, however I decided to include it in this interview clip because it is connected to this idea of performance and identity, she is just looking at it from a gender studies perspective. Personally, I don't think I will include this part in my final video, but it is definitely blog worthy. Sara on the other hand discusses her relations with the opposite sex, which is brought up often in Sherry Turkle's book, Alone Together. Turkle discusses how texting and other social mediums that involve texting gives people "room for performance. The 'real me' turns out to be elusive" (180). She also specifically talks about how "a text message might give the impression of spontaneity to its recipient, but teenagers admit they might spend ten minutes editing its opening line to get it just right" which is exactly what Sara talks about (200). The idea that texting gives you time to think and edit what you want to say, you can retract something before its heard so that you don't embarrass yourself.

Works Cited:

Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together. New York: Basic Books, 2011.