ABSTRACT

In this chapter, the author provides a detailed discussion of the Critical Sensemaking (CSM) framework expanding upon the micro-level psycho-social properties of sensemaking and making connections to the critical context in which the properties operate. She also provides the necessary tools to evaluate how virtual identities are made meaningful through social media of identity enacted. Identity construction as a sensemaking property is seen as an ongoing process where people learn about their identities by projecting them into an environment and observing the consequences. In the modern communication environment, individuals are overwhelmed with messages, images and text. It is impossible to take in all the communicative cues of a modern, socially mediated digital environment. From the constitutive of organization (CCO) perspective, R. McPhee and P. Zaug argued that all communication has constitutive force in that all communication constitutes socially recognized agency and calls relationships.