Who Am I?

Abstract

This chapter focuses on how culture and the new media shape one's identity. While culture and one's family initially shape one's identity, the new media provide new ideas and lifestyles that influence one's identity. One's identity changes throughout one's lifespan, and the new media presents more information and alternative lifestyle choices for individuals. Identity itself is a complex concept and the self is viewed as the continuing, consistent narrative that one presents over one's lifetime and over different contexts. The new media enable people to develop online identities, and such identities may be authentic or inauthentic when compared to one's real life identity. The new media present different venues for developing and expressing one's self. The new media also enable individuals to maintain cultural and identity links with their home culture although they may have located elsewhere in the world.