Locating Identities in Time: An Examination of the Formation and Impact of Temporality on Presentations of the Self Through Location-based Social Networks

Papangelis, Konstantinos; Lykourentzou, Ioanna; Khan, Vassilis-Javed; Chamberlain, Alan; Cao, Ting; Saker, Michael; Lalone, Nicolas

Abstract

Studies of identity and location-based social networks (LBSN) have tended to focus on the performative aspects associated with marking one’s location. Yet, these studies often present this practice as being an a priori aspect of locative media. What is missing from this research is a more granular understanding of how this process develops over time. Accordingly, we focus on the first six weeks of 42 users beginning to use an LBSN we designed and named GeoMoments. Through our analysis of our users’ activities, we contribute to understanding identity and LBSN in two distinct ways. First, we show how LBSN users develop and perform self-identity over time. Second, we highlight the extent these temporal processes reshape the behaviors of users. Overall, our results illustrate that while a performative use of GeoMoments does evolve, this development does not occur in a vacuum. Rather, it occurs within the dynamic context of everyday life, which is prompted, conditioned, and mediated by the way the affordances of GeoMoments digitally organize and archive past locational traces.

Citation

Papangelis, K., Lykourentzou, I., Khan, V., Chamberlain, A., Cao, T., Saker, M., & Lalone, N. (2021). Locating Identities in Time: An Examination of the Formation and Impact of Temporality on Presentations of the Self Through Location-based Social Networks. ACM Transactions on Social Computing, 4(3), 1-23. https://doi.org/10.1145/3473043

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 28, 2021
• Online Publication Date: Oct 8, 2021
• Publication Date: Sep 30, 2021
• Deposit Date: Jul 19, 2021
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 30, 2021
• Journal: ACM Transactions on Social Computing
• Print ISSN: 2469-7818
• Electronic ISSN: 2469-7826
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 4
• Issue: 3
• Article Number: 10
• Pages: 1-23
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3473043
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/5805670
• Publisher URL: https://dl.acm.org/doi/fullHtml/10.1145/3473043
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