Self

A look into the cultural and social phenomenon of the selfie and how it is perceived

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future of selfies

The rapid rise of selfies as a part of our everyday culture, connecting us with family friends, strangers and the world, looks unlikely to go away anytime soon. Jerry Satlz considered selfies to be a new genre of art and already there have been exhibitions dedicated to the selfie as art (Saltz 2014).

Like the snap happy Instagram stars today, perhaps there will be master selfie takers who in years times we will come to revere and admire as much as master artists from the past.

Already, as we have seen, the selfie has moved away from the first early selfies, taken on blurry digital cameras to the internet ready, carefully organised glamour shots we are coming to know.

The future of the selfie is unknown, but we know it is here to stay.

[emilyratajkowskifashionstyle]

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image credit to Kim Kardashian West

Take what ever pictures you want

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but really...

The media focus and hysteria surrounding shared selfies focuses particularly on the prevalence of such image sharing on Snapchat (Cook 2013), though Lukasz Piwek and Adam Joinson found in one study that the majority of snapchat users don’t send explicit images (Piwek, Joinson 2015, p.359).

Piwek and Joinson’s study found that only a very small percentage of their participants, mostly aged between 16 and 25, used snapchat explicitly to send risqué photos, instead their finding supported the idea that people use snapchat and take images of themselves for fun (p.365).

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a small example of results that come up when searching for sending nudes on Google

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selfie(ish) reactions

The policing of women and girls bodies is nothing new, it’s a phenomenon as old as the Abrahamic religions. The panic about how women present themselves in public has only increased with the selfies rise in popularity.

The fear of young girls being exploited is not without reason, as girls and women are most likely to be the victims of images being stolen or shared publicly (Laird 2013, p47, 46).

However, as Albury found in her chat with young Australians, “…boys and girls seemed equally likely to make and share naked or semi-naked selfies” and “While young men’s bodies could be read as sexy, discussions of the sneaky-hat selfie and other joke images indicated that young men’s self-representations were not subject to the same kinds of adult surveillance that young women’s pictures” (p 1742).

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selfies culturally

Kath Albury, in discussions with young Australian men and women, found that they were aware of the double standard when it came to presentations of male and female bodies (p.1738). She recounts how several girls in one group complained that they were excessively, in their opinions, monitored with teachers checking hem length of school uniforms and parents policing Facebook profiles for ‘provocative’ pictures.

This was contrasted by the experience of the boys in the group, who seemed to be able to appear naked or semi-nude online and in pictures without it being read as sexual by parents or friends.

Albury spends a bit of time discussing the ‘sneaky hat’ phenomenon, a naked picture taken with a strategically placed hat, covering obviously naked genitals (p.1738, 1739). When picked up by Australian news outlets, the moral panic that ensued, despite both girls and boys participating, focused on images of young women (p.1739).

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male selfies are seen differently to female selfies

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In advertising vs society

While selfie taking is not limited exclusively to youth, due to its proliferation in the digital sphere, the widespread use of selfies on social media and young people typically taking up new technology faster, conversations around selfies often centre on young people and their use of the selfie. (Fields and Carter 2015, p.101)

In Teresa Senft and Nancy Baym’s 2015 article ‘What does the Selfie Say?’ they discuss how the ‘discourse about the cultural meanings of selfies have tended to extremes. On one hand, marketing and advertising portray selfie taking as fun and frivolous, an indication that one is young, connected and with the times. 

On the other hand, news media portrays selfie taking as indicative of the state of the world, full of narcissistic, selfish and disconnected young people who can’t see beyond the screen of their mobile phone. Selfies have been blamed for things such as mental disorders, depression, accidents, self-harm and death (p.1589).

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Screenshot from my facebook feed

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Photograph taken of myself #selfie

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Selfies today

Today, selfies can be defined in several ways  

-‘a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website’ (Oxford Dictionary 2013)

- ‘fast self-portrait, made with a smartphone’s camera and immediately distributed and inscribed into a network, is an instant visual communication of where we are, what we’re doing, who we think we are, and who we think is watching’ (Saltz 2014)

- ‘a selfie is a photographic object that initiates transmission of human feeling in the form of a relationship (between photographer and photographed, between image and filtering software, between viewer and viewed, between individuals circulating images, between users and social software architectures, etc). (Senft and Baym 2015, p.1589).

- “a person taking a picture of themselves at arm’s length” (Fields and Cater 2015, p.103)

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Selfie Queen

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Dangerous Selfies. Image credit the Guardian 

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The selfie phenomenon

Selfies are a product of technology. As cameras became smaller and more accessible, eventually merging into the mobile smart phone, instances of self-portraiture, selfies, has continued to increase, with millions of selfies being taken and shared across the world every day (Iqani and Schroeder 2016, p.407, Senft and Baym 2015 p.1588). Apps such as Instagram and Snapchat, created specifically for image, have millions of users.

While celebrities such as Taylor Swift, Kim Kardashian West, members from boy band One Direction and even Instagram itself have millions on followers, some savvy ordinary people have found fame using Instagram, documenting things ranging from ‘lifestyle blogging’ on fashion, food to fitness.

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The selfie that broke the internet

this is considered one of the most famous selfies in the world Image credit Ellen Degeneres

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the first selfie

The Oxford Dictionary’s 2013 word of the year, ‘Selfie’, you might be surprised to find out, has been credited as an Australian invention (at least on the internet). While not suggesting that no one before 2002 took photos of themselves, a young man from the University of New England, posting a photo of self-inflicted drunken injuries, is credited with the first use of the word ‘Selfie’ on the internet (Pearlman 2013).