The document summarizes a workshop on analyzing selfies from social media as personal narratives. It discusses selfies as cultural standards as well as disruptions to those standards through different types of selfie narratives related to health, celebrities, appropriation, and critique. The conclusion is that the communicative nature of selfies means their meaning depends more on the context in which they are shared rather than formal analysis alone.

1. ECREA Digital Culture Workshop
University of Salzburg 26-27 November 2015
Antoni Roig, Elisenda Ardèvol, Gemma San Cornelio
Universitat Oberta de Catalunya

2. Context of the research
Focus on personal narratives generated by users in
social networks.
Selfie as object of study: current example of the
modes of representation of self?
Mixed methods: quantitative analysis and qualitative
analysis with a two-folded aim:
1) to foster the debate on the possibilities and
limitations of “Data Analytics” in social research
2) to expand qualitative research on this issue,
providing a framework of analysis from Big Data.
"Selfiestories and personal data" - Project funded by the BBVA - 12/2015- 12/2016
www.selfiestories.net

3. Some theoretical references
Selfie as ‘performed’ in different social contexts as part of a personal or
collective narrative (Vivien and Burgess, 2013).
Selfie in a broader spectrum of images and narrative threads that emerge within
and between images conforming larger narrative streams or feeds (Fallon,
2014).
Selfie understood as a cultural form beyond the ‘selfie tag’ (Gunthert, 2015)
Social and technological devices are key to the understanding of the practices
of the selfie and constitute an ‘alternative genealogy’, along with chats and
other ways of technology-mediated interaction (Gómez and Thornham, 2015)
Big data needs thick data (Wang, 2013)www.selfiestories.net

4. Selfie, a cultural standard?
Technical standards -> norms, values and
conventions to facilitate communication across
formats, platforms, etc.
Aesthetic standards-> Canon as normative
concept related to conventionally accepted
that it is following the ‘correct’, ‘normal’ or
common form.
Photographic rules -> related to formal standards
for portraiture.
www.selfiestories.net

5. Selfie as a visual standard
The “selfie” can be considered a visual
standard as it is a formalized kind of media
image and production, which is structured by
a number of stylistic conventions. These
include the conflation of photographer and
subject, a framing in which the subject
dominates the foreground of the image, and
the subject typically looking directly into the
lens, and a perspective that is generally front-
view from above (Meese et al. p. 1820).
www.selfiestories.net

6. Formal analysis of selfies
From a formal perspective, selfies have some
common traits that some authors have analysed,
trying to find rules.
Manovich - Selfiecity (2013) They find some slightly
different poses (such as the head tilt, or the
tendency to smile) in the different cities where the
selfies were extracted
Bruno et al (2014, 2015) look at photographic rules
(thirds rule, the golden rule, eye centering, or
choosing the right side of the profile). They are
not applied mainly to selfies.
www.selfiestories.net
Thirds rule

7. The communicative nature of selfies
Selfies are more than visual standards, they
are communicative objects (Gómez and
Thornham, 2015) ---> cultural standard
Sel·fie: /ˈselfē/ noun (informal)
A photograph that one has taken of oneself,
typically one taken a smartphone or webcam and
shared via social media.
(Oxford dictionaries, 2013)
www.selfiestories.net

8. The double nature of the selfie
The selfie as a digital object and cultural standard
is interpreted by different logics in digital
narratives:
the database and the storytelling
(Manovich,2001)
- Searching engines
- Folk taxonomies and hashtags
- Instagram streamline
www.selfiestories.net

9. Selfie narratives in database collections
Joan Fontcuberta (2010) Reflectograms -
Through the mirror exhibition (self-
portraits on the Internet, with a mirror)
Richard Prince (2015) exhibition on
instagram selfies (appropriation and
curation without permission)
Lev Manovich Selfiecity (2013) project
collecting selfies from instagram in
different cities
www.selfiestories.net

10. Selfie narratives: disrupting the standards
The disruptive selfies are based on the
social conventions of the standard to
be understandable.
Disruptive selfies enrich the
conversation by telling different
stories.
Its meaning is constructed by
disrupting / playing with the social
conventions of mass communication.
www.selfiestories.net

11. Selfies and the personal narratives of the body
Health, the body and lifesyle Personal stories of survival
www.selfiestories.net

12. Selfies and the personal narratives of the body
Selling a lifestyle Celebrities, authenticity and the
feminized body
www.selfiestories.net

13. Digital celebrities and the selfie
Spanish Youtube Celebrities
Selfie between parody and self-
celebration
www.selfiestories.net

14. Digital celebrities and the selfie
spanish Youtube Celebrities
Selfie between parody and self-
celebration
www.selfiestories.net

15. Appropriations, critique and fakes
Abdou Diouf: a fake journey Amalia Ullman: a fake celebrity
www.selfiestories.net

16. Appropriations, critique and fakes
If Disney characters had Instagram accounts
(Illustrator Simona Bofanini project)
Selfies and the banalization of tragedy
(the Carlos Herrera case)
www.selfiestories.net

17. Conclusions
Formal canon is unable to grasp selfies meaning because
of its communicative character: its meaning depends on
context (streams, text, comments, filters, social media
platforms)
Selfies: stories not only about the self, but about a self
embedded in a socialized media world (don’t fit in the
cultural standard).
Its standardization (through mass-media) produces
normativity which is playfully/seriously contested through
disruption practices.
Disruptive practices contribute to the enrichment of the
communicative process (unlike in the case of
technological standards)
www.selfiestories.net

18. Conclusions
KEEP CALM
&
TAKE A SELFIE
Thank You!
www.selfiestories.net