Identity and Secrecy in a Technological Age Abstract

This essay will investigate the meaning of the cultural object of identity and the critical and theoretical ways in which identity can be self-constructed, rooted within secrecy, and threatened in our modern technological age. I will begin by defining identity in relation to the individual and the ways in which it can exist culturally as a both a privatized and publicized cultural object and the complications that can arise when personal identities become a part of public property in the open access environment of the internet. I will particularly examine social media avenues such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and online dating sites, through which individuals can both reaffirm their identities and artfully reconstruct their identities for an external audience of followers.

The particular problem I will investigate will involve what happens when an individual’s publically revealed secrets (via images and blogging) can get into the wrong hands. I will explore identity theft as a means of surveillance and as a psychological exploration of an individual’s “secrecy” and discomfort regarding their own identities. I will ground this study on identity theft in the media objects of online dating sites as revealed through television shows such as Catfish, which investigate scenarios in which online dating encounters can go wrong when one or both parties disguise their true identities and adapt the physical or social characteristics of another. Through a cultural studies approach I will examine how social relations involving the representation of ones identity gradually become defined and endangered through online means, where dating sites and social media can be held responsible for both allowing for the fabrication of one’s identity and for utilizing technology as a virtual “safe haven” to replace human interaction in the real world, keeping the secrets of some public and available for disposal and the secrets of others private and hidden under a masquerade of  innovation and technological dependency.