Identity Construction

Get on My Level: How Black American Adolescent Girls Construct Identity and Negotiate Sexuality on the Internet.

Neil Postman, a famous American author, media theorist, and cultural critic, once wrote about how the Internet and the new media are eroding childhood innocence at an age much too early. He could not be further from the truth. Traditionally, research and other investigative reports have been focused largely on the white adolescent girls and their identity pursuits on the internet. Black adolescent girls and girls of color, who have all along been peers with their white counterparts, were not devoid of these social constructs. As a result, they have also begun to capitalize on finding their own identity the Internet.

According to Carla Stokes, “Black American adolescent girls are surrounded by unhealthy messages and images of black women and girls as hypersexual and deviant in mass media and pop culture including the internet and hip hop music videos. Growing up in an internet age where internet technologies such as youtube, facebook, Web 2.0 technologies etc, abounds, black adolescents have become internet savvy. However, many black adolescent girls construct self definitions that portray them in sensual ways just like how the media and hip hop portrays them.

Many of the girls use a site called NevaEvaLand in which they profile themselves with their autobiographical information, blogs, photo galleries, comments etc. Many of these websites can be very sexual and very explicit both in text and graphics. Would it be fair to say that the unhealthy messages and images of black women and girls contribute to the shaping of these sexually charged websites? Or are black adolescent girls and other girls of color searching for their own identity by design? Maybe it is because pornography is only a click away on the computer that these girls become viewers to satisfy their curiosity. Whatever is the reason, I can’t help but to agree with Neil Postman that the Internet and new media are eroding childhood innocence at too early an age.

Black adolescent girls must be given credit for their skill and ability to use the Internet and continue the hip hop tradition by using technological innovations profiles. Their manipulation of new media technologies to give themselves a voice, their abilities to become producers and owners, and their interaction with the world etc. are favorable traits. Black girls are also in a position to critique the media and collaborate with them to produce more supportive and culturally safe places on the internet. They are also in a position to challenge the status quo that exploits women in the media and instead, promote self worth for the girls.