Abstract
People’s identities (i.e., who they are) are increasingly performed in both physical and digital spaces. Individuals become cyborgs as they extend their presence and bodily senses through digital bodies (e.g., social media profiles, blog posts and avatars). To gain insight into how people make sense of who they are in the face of their digital extensions, a photo-diary method is advanced in this paper. Using a single photo-diary entry and its associated interview, this short paper illustrated empirically the material and discursive practices a user of the virtual world, Second Life, enacted to dynamically draw boundaries to construct her and her avatar’s identities.
Funding from the National Science Foundation, Grant IIS‐0848692, made this research possible. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. I am also deeply indebted to the research participants for fully embracing this study and sharing their experiences and insights openly.
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Schultze, U. (2012). Using Photo-Diary Interviews to Study Cyborgian Identity Performance in Virtual Worlds. In: Bhattacherjee, A., Fitzgerald, B. (eds) Shaping the Future of ICT Research. Methods and Approaches. IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology, vol 389. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35142-6_6
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