Social Networking (week #14)

Social Networking sites are everywhere these days and you are probably a part of two or three of them. Whether you belong to Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, or Twitter, you are engaging in an online platform that offers modes of self-presentation and sociability. On any of these sites there is a convergence of public and private boundaries, because let’s face it your sharing your life with more people than you think. But these places are also a place to contribute to topics in more ways than just having a conversation face-to-face with someone. You can chat with people you never will have the chance to meet on a topic that is happening all around the world. In doing so, you can gain a perspective on the topic that you never thought you could have gotten. That is pretty cool if you ask me.  

Let us dive a little deeper into one of these Social Networking sites, Twitter. "Twitter is a microblogging site that allows users to send messages of 140 characters or less ("tweets") to people who have chosen to "follow" them..." (Florini, 2013).We all know about Twitter and how Twitter is famous for their use of the hashtag, right? Well if not, a hashtag is something used to organize everyone’s Twitter posts under what they put next to “#”, which used to be called the pound sign but now it is the hashtag (side note). Organizing ‘tweets’ based off of the hashtag that they are associated with is a great idea, because it allows anyone to do a search for ‘trending topics’ and gives anyone access to what people are saying about a particular show, a song on the radio, a celebrity, the list could go on forever. Honestly, the possibilities are endless when it comes to what you will find is ‘trending’ on a particular day.

Sometimes what people put next to “#” is funny or sometimes it is something that is happening in the world like a news event or if the day is a significant day in the month. Today for instance you can search what is trending on Twitter and the “Top Trend” is #EarthDay. As of 5pm on Wednesday April 22, 2015 there are 686k hashtags out on Twitter about Earth Day. #UnpopularActionMovies also comes up as a “Top Trend” coming in with 14.9k people using this hashtag. There really is a lot of diversity when it comes to what is a “Top Trend” on Twitter.
The thing that still baffles me is that people from all over the world can join in on what is trending by just using a hashtag. That way everyone’s voice is heard on a particular subject and the conversation can continue to grow based on everyone’s input. Maybe if in real life, as in life not spent in front of a screen, you are a shy person who does not really push yourself to join in on a conversation, with Twitter or any other Social Networking site you can get your opinion out there and get your voice heard. Social Networking sites are without a doubt a way to present yourself in a way that in real life you cannot. 

As much as Twitter can bring people together over topics, it can also create closed off communities based off of language used in the 'Top Trend'.  "Black users are most visible in the 'trending topics', a real-time list of the most tweeted about subjects. Twitter's trending topics list frequently features topics in which Black users are the majority or that have a direct association with Black American cultures" (Florini, 2013). Even though Twitter is open to everyone, sometimes words used in a particular community such as the Black community, people outside of that community do not really understand terms or phrases used within that community. "Signifyin' is a genre of linguistic performance that allows for the communication of multiple levels of meaning simultaneously, most frequently involving wordplay and misdirection" (Florini, 2013). 'Signifyin' is a way that the Black community on Twitter can use the space to "express Black cultural knowledge" (Florini, 2013). It is a way to create cultural difference and make a 'special group' on an otherwise open forum. Although Twitter is indeed open to everyone with access to the internet, it really is not open to all through the use of language.