Commenting the picture: teenagers in online communities and textual discourses on bodies, sexuality and gender

This inquiry shows how youths negotiate sexualities and gender when commenting on profile pictures on a social network site (SNS). Attention is given to (1) how discourses are constituted within heteronormativity, and (2) how the mediated nature of the SNS contributes to resistance. Using insights from cultural media studies, social theory and queer criticism, representations in SNSs are viewed as sites of struggle. A textual analysis is used to show how commenting on a picture is a gendered practice, continuously cohering between the naturally given sex, performative gender and demanded desire. Significant resignifications show how SNSs are places for change, supporting an intimate citizenship