ABSTRACT
I provide a detailed analysis of the ways in which people create their online selves and negotiate their impression management. Technical and mechanical aspects of creating an online self are relatively simple; sociocultural dynamics of negotiating identification and self-representation are not. This chapter examines how the participants create their online self and manage impressions with respect to macro-level Discourses in online spaces. Specifically, I analyse the interplay between self-representation, identification, and impression management with respect to macro-level societal Discourses. By doing so, I show that online spaces do not disembody people or decontextualise social engagements. By analysing what it means to represent the self and what it means to negotiate impressions in mediated spaces, I demonstrate that people use material resources available to them in their daily-life realities when they dialogically create a shared social reality. I illustrate how impression management is shaped by the dynamics of race and ethnicity, with a particular focus on the Discourses of whiteness and white supremacy. Finally, I argue that as people perform their selves, they create a discursive regime in mediated spaces.
