1st Edition
Gay Men, Identity and Social Media A Culture of Participatory Reluctance
This book explores how the social and technical integration of mainstream social media into gay men’s digital cultures since the mid 2000s has played out in the lives of young gay men, looking at how these convergences have influenced more recent iterations of gay men’s digital culture. Focusing on platforms such as Gaydar, Facebook, Grindr and Instagram, Cassidy highlights the ways that identity and privacy management issues experienced in this context have helped to generate a culture of participatory reluctance within gay men’s digital environments.
1. Gay Men’s Digital Culture and Participatory Reluctance: An Introductio
2. From The Hankie Code to The Hanky App: Historical Change, Technological Development and Shifting GLBT Identities
3. Gaydar Cultures: The Only ‘Good’ Gay In The Village?
4. Facebook and Its Role in Gaydar Cultures
5. Consequences of Convergence - Privacy and Safety Concerns
6. Participatory Reluctance Post-Gaydar
Biography
Elija Cassidy is a Lecturer in Journalism, Media, and Communication at Queensland University of Technology, Australia.
"Cassidy has answered the call a number of us have been making for a solid empirical study of social media habits in the LGBTQ communities. The specific social media venues may change with time but what his work has to teach us about identity formation and performance, the formation of social capital, and the building of social networks will influence our agendas and thinking for years to come." – Bruce E. Drushel, Miami University, USA
"An elegant book that makes significant contributions to our understandings of gay male internet use, but more generally to how social media, place, and subcultures come together to shape identity." – Nancy Baym, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
"This work offers important and compelling insights into how gay men utilize social networking sites. Given that the online experiences of sexual minorities are woefully understudied, Elija Cassidy’s study is a welcome work indeed." – John Edward Campbell, Temple University, USA
