Social media, characterized by user-generated content, interactivity, participation and community formation, have gained much research attention in recent years. At the same time, intimacy, affectivity and emotions are increasingly growing as fields of study. While these two areas are often interwoven, the actual interconnections are rarely studied in detail. This anthology explores how social media construct new types of intimacies, and how practices of intimacy shape the development and use of new media, offering empirical knowledge, theoretical insights and an international perspective on the flourishing field of digital intimacies.
Chapters present a range of research tools used, such as interviews, online ethnography, visual analysis, text analysis and video analysis. There is also rich variation in sources for the empirical material studied, including Tumblr, YouTube, dating sites, hook-up sites, Facebook, Snapchat, Couchsurfing, selfies, blogs and photographs, as well as smartphones, tablets and computers.
By focusing on the intersection between social media and intimacies, and their continuous co-constitution, this anthology offers new insights into the vast landscape of contemporary media reality. It will be a valuable resource for teachers, students and scholars with an interest in new media, communication, intimacy and affectivity.
List of Figures, List of Contributors 1. Introduction - Michael Nebeling Petersen, Katherine Harrison, Tobias Raun and Rikke Andreassen Section 1: Communities and Activism 2. 'Something substantive enough to reach out and touch': The intimate politics of digital anti-rape activism - Debra Ferreday 3. Intimate communities: Hackerspaces, digital engagement and affective relations - Sarah R. Davies 4. Online community and new family scripts - Rikke Andreassen 5. Textures of intimacy: Witnessing embodied mobile loss, affect and heartbreak - Lin Prøitz, Larissa Hjorth and Amparo Lasén 6. Edge Effect: New image formations and identity politics - Marco Bohr and Basia Sliwinska Section 2: Relationship Making and Maintenance 7. Innovations in intimacy: Internet Dating in an international frame - Christine Beasley, Mary Holmes, Katherine Harrison and Carolins Wamala Larsson 8. Infrastructures of intimacy - Susanna Paasonen 9. Temporal ephemerality, persistent affectivity: Circulation of intimacies on Snapchat - Jette Kofoed 10. Beyond engineered intimacy: Navigating social media platforms to manage intimate relationships - Christina Miguel 11. In with expectations and out with disappointment: Gay tailored social media and the redefinition of intimacy - Yin Zhang and John Nguyet Erni Section 3 - Integrating and Domesticating 12. Mediating intimacies through mobile communication: Chinese migrant mothers' digital 'bridge of magpies'- Yang Wang and Sun Sun Lim 13. Young children and digital media in the intimacy of the home: Perceptions and mediation - Rita Brito and Patrícia Dias 14. Connecting with the dead: Vernacular practices of mourning through photo-sharing on Facebook - Tobias Raun 15. Bleeding boundaries: Domesticating gay hook-up apps - Kristian Møller and Michael Nebeling Petersen Section 4: Becoming and Performing 16. Teen boys on YouTube: Representations of gender and intimacy - Claire Baileys 17. Technical intimacies and Otherkin becomings - Eva Zekany 18. Broadcasting the bedroom: Intimate musical practices and collapsing contexts on YouTube - Maarten Michielse 19. Fashion blogging as a technology of bodily becoming: The fluidity and firmness of digital bodies - Louise Yung Nielsen 20. 'My Friend Bubz': Building intimacy on YouTube's beauty community - Florencia Garcia-Rapp, Index
