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Signs of belonging
Nov. 15th, 2005 08:48 pmResponses to my last post (about bumper stickers) got me to thinking about signs of belonging. Bumper stickers, for example, not only advertise someone's beliefs and hobbies, but they also signal what community that person belongs to. An inside joke stuck on the back of a car tells other members of the community that you belong.
Everyone wants to belong. But belonging is meaningless if other people don't know you belong. Other people need to know where you belong, and, by extension, where you don't belong.
Most of the messages we send out are subtle. We tell the world about ourselves through our clothes, our cars or other vehicles, our homes, our hairstyles, etc. Many of the things we surround ourselves with in our homes and our office desks, and many of the things we carry in our pockets and purses are, at least in part, symbolic of our membership(s). Individually, a notebook with a cat picture on the front, a cruelty-free cosmetic product, a hemp wallet and a bike lock don't mean anything. But together, they speak about the person carrying them all in their backpack.
The problem is that other people can misunderstand these passive messages. A stranger can't tell if you are wearing thrift store clothing because you don't have a lot of money or because you choose not to spend money on new clothing as a way of resisting wasteful consumerism. Or both. To clarify where we belong, we add active signs: bumper stickers, membership cards, pins, backpack patches, etc.
This leads me to thinking about identity and membership in LJ. Before you start reading someone's journal regularly and getting to know their personality (as presented in this personal but public format), much of what you know about a person here is their LJ icons - the equivilent of their physical appearance, prehaps - and their interest lists and community lists: their chosen memberships.
When creating and editing your LJ account, do you pick and choose your interests to indicate the kinds of communities you want other people to know you are in?
Everyone wants to belong. But belonging is meaningless if other people don't know you belong. Other people need to know where you belong, and, by extension, where you don't belong.
Most of the messages we send out are subtle. We tell the world about ourselves through our clothes, our cars or other vehicles, our homes, our hairstyles, etc. Many of the things we surround ourselves with in our homes and our office desks, and many of the things we carry in our pockets and purses are, at least in part, symbolic of our membership(s). Individually, a notebook with a cat picture on the front, a cruelty-free cosmetic product, a hemp wallet and a bike lock don't mean anything. But together, they speak about the person carrying them all in their backpack.
The problem is that other people can misunderstand these passive messages. A stranger can't tell if you are wearing thrift store clothing because you don't have a lot of money or because you choose not to spend money on new clothing as a way of resisting wasteful consumerism. Or both. To clarify where we belong, we add active signs: bumper stickers, membership cards, pins, backpack patches, etc.
This leads me to thinking about identity and membership in LJ. Before you start reading someone's journal regularly and getting to know their personality (as presented in this personal but public format), much of what you know about a person here is their LJ icons - the equivilent of their physical appearance, prehaps - and their interest lists and community lists: their chosen memberships.
When creating and editing your LJ account, do you pick and choose your interests to indicate the kinds of communities you want other people to know you are in?
