Threaded Identity 1

Running Head: Threaded Identity in Cyberspace

Threaded Identity in Cyberspace:

Weblogs & Positioning in the Dialogical Self

Vincent W. Hevern

Le Moyne College

NOTE: THIS IS AN UNCORRECTED MANUSCRIPT

VERSION OF THE ARTICLE PRIOR TO
PUBLICATION.THERE WERE NO SUBSTANTIAL
MODIFICATIONS IN THE PUBLISHED VERSION,
BUT THERE WERE SOME INCIDENTAL CHANGES.
 Threaded Identity 2

Abstract

The rapid emergence of internet-based personal weblogs

(“blogs”) reflects specific technological innovations and new
online practices with broad affinity for the self as
dialogical. This study employs qualitative analyses of the
structural components and selected postings from a spectrum of
20 English-language blogs. Weblogs display multiple and
shifting positionings in the form of ongoing, personally-
meaningful, and hypertextually-threaded themes. A Jamesian
“stream of thought” quality characterizes many blog entries
when read chronologically. Yet, the active posting of
contradictory or competing personal viewpoints reflects the
polyphonic qualities of the dialogical self suggested by
Bakhtin’s analysis of authorship. As such, blogs serve as
explicit examples of Herman’s (2001) systematic model of the
multivoiced self’s active encounter with social and cultural
others. The sequencing of commentaries in some weblogs
illustrates processes of cultural exchange by which authors
thread pathways through overlapping but somewhat different
positionings in processes of negotiating new or changing
identities.
 Threaded Identity 3

Threaded Identity in Cyberspace: Weblogs & Positioning in the

Dialogical Self

Over the past two decades, both psychology and

communications have found their respective domains challenged
by basic theoretical and practical developments regarding the
nature of the self and forms of public interchange. The
discursive turn in the social sciences has set in deep relief
the centrality of language, narrative, and the impact of
cultural tools in the development of the human person (Bruner,
1990; Valsiner, 1998). Within this perspective, the nature of
the self has been variously characterized as "protean"
(Lifton, 1993), "saturated" (Gergen, 1991), "multiple"
(Rosenberg, 1997) and "narrated" or "storied" (Sarbin, 1986).
A particularly promising formulation -- the self as
"dialogical" -- has been articulated by Hermans and others
(Hermans, 1996, 2001; Hermans & Kempen, 1993). Likening the
dialogical self to "a society of minds," Hermans adapts both
the Jamesian notion of the "me" as socially extended and
Bakhtin's theory of dialogism and heteroglossia in literary
creation (Barresi, 2002). Hermans argues for a decentralized
self of multiple "I" positions in constant dialogue with each
other and with a similarly decentralized cultural universe of
other selves and practices (Hermans, 2001). Further, Hermans
(2001) underscores movement--a temporal ebb and flow--among
the positions within the "I" as the self dialogues with
parallel positions among other selves and the cultural world
more generally.
Crucial aspects of contemporary culture are those new
forms of mass communication media which profoundly affect the
development and expression of human lives (Levinson, 1998).
Among these media, the Internet ("Net") has emerged as the
fastest growing and arguably most influential in its impact
upon human society (Harnad, 1991). How humans function within
the Net's cyberspacial confines and are, in turn, affected by
their experiences has begun to receive scholarly attention
(e.g., Gackenbach, 1998). In this light, a potentially
fruitful arena of investigation is the conjunction between the
Internet as a growing collection of technologies broadly
engaging the self and Herman's dialogical formulation of the
nature of personhood.
Hermans (2001) asks, "What happens in the minds of
people, and in their practices, when they entertain intensive
contacts with representatives of other cultures without any
 Threaded Identity 4

bodily, localized contact?" (p. 273). Research on this

question has already proven productive. For example, Talamo
and Ligorio (2001) studied identity construction within an
Internet virtual world; they charted varying dynamic processes
of negotiation by which the self is constructed along strongly
dialogical lines. Hevern (2000) examined personal homepage
construction as a means of self-expression by members of
alterity groups; he identified multiple structural elements
and forms of self-presentation which reflect upon the self as
dialogical and their authors as motivated storytellers.
This paper extends Hevern's (2000) earlier analysis and
addresses Hermans' (2001) speculation by examining a newly
emergent Net environment, the personal weblog ("blog"; Blood,
2002). At its simplest, a weblog is an online page containing
a collection of links and associated textual commentaries or
annotations, presented in reverse chronological order, to
which new entries (links & text) are added on a frequent
basis. Weblogs have shown explosive growth in popularity,
e.g., one specific weblog format, Blogger, had more than
750,000 subscribers in the early fall of 2002 (Blogger, 2002).
Weblogs permit authors or "bloggers" to engage in varying
online practices of self-presentation which I describe
metaphorically as "threaded." And, I argue that the self
emerging from these threaded activities resonates closely with
Herman's (2001) positioning theory regarding the dialogical
self as it interacts within its own personal and socio-
cultural worlds. The practice of weblogging offers a concrete
instantiation of such a dialogical self.
How did weblogs develop as a format of online expression?
Evolving from both personal diaries and annotated lists of
favorite links at traditional personal homepages, entire
online pages--originally called "news sites" or "filters"--
began to offer browsers selective content guides to the web's
offerings by the late 1990s (Blood, 2002). Such sites which
selected or filtered web content were called "weblogs"
(borrowed from author Jorn Barger) by Cameron Barrett in 1999
(Barrett, 2002; Blood, 2002). Since then, these early blogs
have been complemented by a vast host of other blogs.
Weblogs' recent appearance is mirrored by the absence of
scholarly research about this media form; most published
comment come from journalists and general writers (e.g.,
Safire, 2002; Shulevitz, 2002). Blood (2002) authored a
popular handbook about weblogging and the Editors of Perseus
Publishing (2002) printed a collection of articles on weblogs
which had originally appeared online. Some scholars argue
about the role of weblogs versus traditional forms of
 Threaded Identity 5

journalism without addressing more personal uses of blogs

(e.g, Lasica, 2002; Palser, 2002). Mortensen & Walker (2002)
relate blogging practices to broader social networks within
which bloggers write. However, scholars from disciplines like
psychology and sociology have not yet published analyses of
the role(s) played by weblogs in relation to identity
construction or the strategies and tactics of self-
presentation which earlier researchers (e.g., Markham, 1998)
have examined in other domains of cyberspace
Method

Weblog Collection
Data were derived from the online presentation of 20
personal weblogs.1 As this study began, the burgeoning growth
of weblogs was not mirrored by a corresponding effort to build
a comprehensive public census of available blogs. Rather,
available but limited directories offered guides to popular or
thematically-linked subgroups of blogs. Thus, assembling an
actual random sample of weblogs for this investigation was
judged to be unfeasible and a broad variety of blog types was
chosen instead from for review from other sources. These types
included (1) explicitly journalistic or (2) political-
ideological blogs and those of individuals (3) with deep
interest in Internet culture, (4) from alterity groups (either
gay men or physically disabled persons), or (5) with a general
personal focus. Criteria for inclusion required that the
authors had published their blogs for at least two months,
included a minimum of four entries in any single month, be
written in English, and, if possible, be identifiable as
originating in North America (U.S. and Canada). Note that
authors chosen for inclusion in this study had been posting
their blogs online for an mean of 22.4 months (SD = 18.3;
Range = 4-64 months).
For each blog in the sample, the raw data consisted of
(1) the current front page, (2) the previous two to six weeks
of archived postings (generally all materials posted during
June and July 2002), (3) any archived postings from September,
2001, and (4) any ancillary pages, e.g., those headed "About,"
"FAQ" (Frequently Asked Questions), or containing biographical
statements or lists of links. The final set of data consisted
of 218 individual web subpages (average per blog = 10.8
subpages, SD = 13.4; Range = 4-66).
Data Analysis
 Threaded Identity 6

A two-stage qualitative analytic strategy was employed to

review the weblogs (Creswell, 1998, Wolcott, 1994).
1st Stage. Using what has previously been called a form of
digital ethnography (Hevern, 2000), the content of the weblogs
was examined structurally. Common elements or components
across multiple weblogs which reflected potential mechanisms
of self-presentation were isolated. Each of these elements was
grouped under one of three primary characteristics:
textuality, graphical content, or potential to promote
interaction (or contact) between the author and blog reader.
2nd Stage. Subsequently separate postings were analyzed in
three substages: first, the functional role of selected
postings across multiple blogs was examined and a range of
common forms and activities which repeatedly appear among
these data was isolated. Secondly, the ways in which the
authors responded within their blogs to the events of
September 11, 2001 and their aftermath was reviewed as a
common cultural-historical event which may have elicited what
Hermans (2001) has termed "moving positions" within the self.
The question was posed: did the subset of 12 blogs published
in September, 2001 demonstrate a flow and flux of positions by
their authors? Finally, the collective postings within
individual blogs were examined to consider how strategically
they might model aspects of dialogical processes in
distinctive ways. These analytic approaches sought to
characterize weblog practices largely at macro- and
intermediate levels and left open detailed examinations of
micro-processes within weblogs for future study.
Results

1st Stage: Structural Elements

All weblogs are comprised of at least two structural
elements: a title at the top of the blog and a main channel of
author postings. Titles are usually embedded within a graphic
icon which identifies the weblog and often provides graphical
unity across multiple subpages of the blog. The column
containing the author's dated and posted text (occasionally
accompanied by graphical images) serves as the "main channel";
entries in this channel are displayed in reverse chronological
order (newest at the column's top). Most blogs contain more
than these elements. The main channel is frequently
complemented by one or two smaller adjacent channels in which
authors often place a variety of more enduring links and other
items of information. In this sample, 16 contained either two
 Threaded Identity 7

or three channels, 3 used a single main channel, and 1

comprised two main channels authored by separate bloggers.
What type of items appear among the side channels? I
identified 46 kinds of structural materials including textual
(N = 25), visual or graphic (N = 13), and interactive (N = 8)
elements (Table 1). Authors often provide readers with an
autobiographical orientation through a short rendition of
their general life history or how a major illness or accident
affected their life's story. Personal interests and activities
receive multiple forms of expression via lists of favorite
books or musical albums, sets of beloved poems or song lyrics,
personal preference inventories (sports teams, movies, foods,
performers, etc.), and items detailing other leisure or hobby
pursuits. Personal interests are further expressed through
various types of editorial writing including political or
cultural essays and reviews of music and books. The weblog
form situates the author's activities within the clear
temporal framework of the main channel. Further, past postings
are typically archived by date in easily accessible locations.
[Insert Table 1 about here]
Weblogs display an interest in both visual display and
presentation quality. Each weblog has a distinctive "look and
feel" often with coordinated graphical, typographical, and
formatting schemes deployed in a consistent fashion. The
resulting blog is a personal construction intimately bound to
but different from presentation forms created by (anonymous)
others but available as templates online to new bloggers. This
practice is suggestive of the ways in which weblog
construction sites like Blogger serve as contact zones
culturally and offer a type of visual social language to their
participants (Hermans, 2001). The extended social world of the
web author is expressed concretely in the display of many
types of photographic images (e.g., family, friends, travel
and vacation sites). Similarly, an author's creative interests
may be shown in renditions of drawings and other forms of
artwork (or, textually, in fictional writing and poetry). A
time-dependent form of self-expression is occasionally found
in the use of a webcam -- a type of online television
broadcast in which individual images of the blogger and home
environment are continuously posted in "real time."
Finally, bloggers offer their readers multiple paths by
which to interact with them directly. Blogs generally list
means for readers to contact authors (synchronously) via ICQ or
Instant Messaging or (asynchronously) via email. Readers may
also be invited to sign an online "guestbook," enter their
 Threaded Identity 8

email addresses in a database to receive announcements, or

express their opinions via an online poll.
2nd Stage: Dialogical Processes
A. The Main Channel: Elements and Activity Analysis.
At the heart of the weblog lies the main channel where
authors regularly post and update items online. Besides using
date headings to separate entries, many weblogs (60% of this
sample) employ time stamps so that readers can gauge when an
item was published. Half the blogs also explicitly invite
comments on individual postings by providing a mechanism to
record and display these responses, yet another interactive
form. Thus, readers along with the author can hold a sort of
online conversation on specific postings while the author
continues to add new items.
The main channel serves as a public space in which weblog
authors engage in a range of self-presentation activities. I
identified 11 distinctive types of postings--each showing a
differing performative intent (Table 2). Three elements focus
upon the self internally or reflexively while seven elements
involve a more external interest with "others" --be they
persons, events, expressions, online resources, etc.. One
element, embedding an image in the main channel, may assume
either focus.
[Insert Table 2 about here]
Self-focused elements and activities employ two diary-
like forms: in one, the writer narrates the events of daily
life, and in the other, the author engages in a kind of
reflective self-colloquy, speaking out loud what otherwise
would be internal and inaccessible to others. Weblogs with a
personal or quotidian focus employ these elements extensively.
A third type offers a self-description conveyed by a long list
of disparate personal facts or self-judgments about the self;
they are sometimes headed "100 Things about [Author's Name]".
Such listings--what Hermans (2001) might identify as personal
"positionings"--often reveal obscure, personally-sensitive, or
apparently trivial aspects of the self, for example, Denys in
his weblog, today is the fourteenth…
[<14thbrother.webmages.com>; no longer published], informs his
readers that "I've never seen a shrink…Certain music makes me
cry…My limited [sexual] experience: 3 partners (was 2 until
this month) … I don't think I believe in Jesus."
Among elements with an external focus are two fundamental
sorts identified as Links with Annotations and Links with
Commentaries. In both there is a hyperlink to another website
 Threaded Identity 9

with either a description of what the reader will find there or

with editorial comments that evaluate the content of the link.
Commentaries tend to predominate in "journalistic" and
"political-ideological" weblogs. Thus, AndrewSullivan.com (AS)
repeatedly illustrates extreme liberal bias and reporting
errors in the New York Times. In contrast, Wil Weaton Dot Net
(WWDN) <www.wilwheaton.net> frequently lambastes the current
U. S. government--a position consistent with the author's self-
description as progressive politically and distrustful in
general of both government and business.
Two additional elements of other-focused postings involve
what may be called Aggregated Links in which authors assemble
multiple web resources dealing with the same topic and present
them in a single extended posting. As noted below, several
blogs in the current sample employed such an aggregation when
they reported on the events of September 11, 2001. A second,
related posting form may be designated as a Research Report.
Here, a web author generates a set of resources answering a
particular question or dealing with an issue under
investigation. For example, Peterme.com (July 25, 2002)
annotated eight online resources about the "Internet and
Interpersonal Relationships." Such research reports reinforce
the author's identity as an expert evaluator.

B. Weblogging as a Response to September 11, 2001

When the United States experienced the air attacks at the
World Trade Center and Pentagon, the intense coverage by the
commercial media was paralleled in cyberspace: bloggers began
posting almost immediately and often did not stop for many
hours, even days. Twelve of the 20 blogs in this sample
contain specific postings for that month, for example,

• At the Scripting News <www.scripting.com>, author Dave Winer

uploaded 95 separate items during September 11th itself. Four
photos posted online included a live webcam image of the World
Trade Center on fire. His last message that day summarized his
experience: "Anyway, it's time for me to sign off for the
night. Today I started at about 5:30 AM, and typed and read and
thought and felt every minute of the day. I'm wiped. I'm also
lucky -- I get to come back tomorrow. Thousands of Americans
aren't so lucky. Their families and friends won't sleep so well
tonight. Say a prayer for all of us, and for the world. …"

• Living near the scene of the attacks in New York City,

Choire of East/West [<www.eastwest.nu/blog.shtml>; no longer
published] posted numerous personal photographs taken on the
 Threaded Identity 10

city's streets during the week afterward. His photographs

convey an "on the scene" realism which the commercial news
outlets often did not televise.

• Philo ("West" of East/West) explained one role of webloggers

that day in describing his blog partner, Choire, wandering the
debris-filled streets of New York: "It's almost as if, judging
by all of our email and the links from all over the world that
you [Choire] have become the eyes, ears, nose, mouth and lungs
of Blogville..."
Three themes regarding 9/11 and weblogs were clear in this
sample: (1) sharing the experiences of others via postings was
personally meaningful, (2) experiencing multiple viewpoints in
the form of visual displays and written descriptions of events
gave readers a better understanding of what had happened, and
(3) weblogs and their readers formed a palpable and bonded
community in the immediate aftermath of the attacks.
C. Weblogs & Identity following 9/11/01
A new genre of weblog -- called warblogs -- emerged in
the aftermath of 9/11/01. These warblogs are concerned with
the ramifications of the attacks and the "war on terrorism"
launched by the Bush administration. Their authors speak of
being changed by the events of that day: their postings attest
to such alteration in personal identity. Consider the process
shown in one venue: Jeff Jarvis' WarLog: World War III
<buzzmachine.com>. He was "a block away from the World Trade
Center … when the first of the two towers collapsed…
Completely engulfed in its debris, I joined a mob running
away, screaming, unable to see, unable to breathe anything but
the black cloud" (Jarvis, 2001). He soon began to publish his
blog as an explicit response to his 9/11 experience. Three
months later he reflected:
"In politics, I've endured not just change but ideological
whiplash. I was never politically correct but I was liberal
and from youth I held fast to pacifism… But now our
generation has faced our Hitler in bin Laden and we find a
mortal and moral need to defend against evil. So I am now a
former pacifist… I'm a goddamned patriot. Sometimes, I
don't recognize myself." <http://www.buzzmachine.com/
001_12_01_crisis_archive.html#7831246>
In subsequent months, Jarvis detailed his political opinions
and personal life experiences through lengthy daily postings.
Inside his warblog he entered into an intensive conversation
with himself and many other online writers. His changing
outlook permeates an entire year of postings.
 Threaded Identity 11

D. Weblogging: Identity and Alternative Dialogical Forms

The weblogs in this sample offer an assortment of forms;
they reflect differing approaches to the challenge of identity
construction through the strategic use of alternative
dialogical processes. Consider, for example, these three
weblogs:

• AS. Andrew Sullivan is a gay, sexually active, confessing

Catholic, an émigré to the United States from Britain, a
political conservative and social progressive, a former
print editor for The Nation magazine who authors one of the
most influential journalistic blogs in cyberspace. As
Sullivan's contrasting identity labels anticipate, this
weblog models a polyphony of voices within a single
individual. A menu on his blog juxtaposes "Homosexuality"
with "Faith" and "Culture" with "War" and offers readers
extended essays which articulate Sullivan's contrasting
stances, e.g., one essay posits "a conservative case for gay
marriage" and another "a pro life case for the abortion
pill".

• East/West. Philo in the San Francisco Bay area and Choire in

New York City are partnered in the production of a blog even
though they are physically separated by 3,000 miles. They
have been friends since 1990. But, living on either side of
the U.S., their "website was launched in November 2000 as a
way for us to keep in better touch and have an active part
of each other's lives. We've been keeping it going pretty
much daily ever since." <http://www.eastwest.nu/uspop.html>.

• WWDN. In 1986 the 14-year old actor, Wil Wheaton, starred in

the well-received film, Stand By Me, as a boy coming of age.
The following year, he landed a 3-year role as young trainee
Ensign Wesley Crusher in the popular U.S. television series
Star Trek: The Next Generation. The public persona Wheaton has
carried in the years since these roles strongly emphasized his
youth, inexperience, and status as an adolescent geek or
misfit. Now 30-years old, married, father to two teenagers, and
deeply involved in both a Los Angeles comedy troupe and a
computer gaming company, Wheaton's weblog subverts the
lingering persona while building a bridge to his fans and the
public. In emphatic, often outrageous ways, Wheaton discusses
his daily life, his self-doubts as well as his hopes, his
struggle with his old persona and its effects, and the
experience of residual celebrity. In so doing, he challenges
his old "Wesley Crusher" image as a callow adolescent. Further,
by using cyberspace to reveal selected aspects of his daily
 Threaded Identity 12

life, Wheaton offers the public a kind of intimacy which would

not be possible in person.
These examples illustrate ways in which specific weblog
practices resonate with important qualities of the dialogical
self. Voices within the self are varied, even oppositional and
resist any simple attempt to harmonize their multiplicity into
an unstable synthesis. These voices bring their own histories
whether in the form of extended personal narratives (WWDN) or
as collected essays crafted over years in support of diverse
self-positions (AS). The postmodern condition which eradicates
traditional spatial boundaries permits intimacy and social
exchange from afar physically--witness Philo & Choire--
because, in cyberspace, "nearness is created by interest"
(Weinberger, 2002, p. 49). Further, identity must be
continually negotiated because the self stands at a nexus of
dynamic forces, both cultural and personal, which resist
stasis. And, so, the once 14-year-old celebrity finds in
weblogs a dialogical mechanism to transcend old dichotomies
between the persona as a cultural construction and as a
personal achievement. Whether he will succeed in building a
suitable identity in the future remains uncertain and his
weblog acknowledges that his current solution to selfhood is
tentative.
Discussion
Weblogging as Dialogical Process. The decision to publish
a weblog engages a blogger actively in an array of self-
presentation strategies within the public environment of
cyberspace. Unlike private diaries, weblogs are inherently
public and the posting of items on a blog is a social act of
positioning which, minimally, bids readers to encounter some
aspect of that self which fashioned the item. Unlike other
media, the use of hypertext links in weblogs also invites the
reader to assume the perspective of the author by experiencing
what the author experienced at that link. Weblogs usually
provide avenues by which readers can further the encounter by
entering into explicit conversation with the author. The sites
examined here frequently formed part of extended social
networks where bloggers commented upon or replied to postings
at each other's sites.
Unlike personal homepages, the publishing of a weblog is
an activity profoundly expressive of an author's experience of
time, a fundamental condition for Hermans' (2001) model of
moving positions in the dialogical self. The blogger crafts and
preserves in and across time multiple positions, both internal
and external to the self. These positions demonstrably evolve,
 Threaded Identity 13

shift focus, and interact with other positions in the rhythm of

the author's life as chronicled daily. Sequences of entries are
reminiscent of William James' stream of consciousness: the
diversity of postings may be quite broad and specific items may
show little relationship among themselves. But, the ability of
weblogs to preserve the items in sequence allows both reviewers
and the blog author to identify enduring positions at least
retrospectively as these emerge historically.
Threaded Identity as Metaphor. In his sympathetic
reflection, David Weinberger (2002) argues that "the Web is an
unnatural world, one we have built for ourselves" (p. xi). And,
structuring that new world, he argues, are novel forms of space
and time: space arising in the social encounter of individuals
who find the activities of others online meaningful and time
emerging in the interwoven presentation of stories and personal
narratives throughout every nook and cranny of cyberspace. In
examining personal homepages (Hevern, 2000), I concluded that
the self was constructed dialogically by appropriating
spatially-organized elements including narrative ones at a pace
I'd now judge relatively static. These data argue for a more
active proposition: that time serves as the primary organizing
principle for weblogs. And in this light, we must acknowledge,
as Weinberger (2002) argues, that "[w]eb time is 'threaded'"
(p. 60) in a variety of ways. So, following his lead let me
suggest how threadedness serves as a broad and useful metaphor
in this domain of cyberspace.
The concept of a thread or the activity of threading has
held multiple meanings in English over a long history (Oxford
English Dictionary, 1989). The notion of identity as threaded
resonates with several of these meanings. I propose that at
least three facets of active blog practice are central to the
formation of online identity and can be highlighted by invoking
three distinctive though overlapping metaphors of threading.

• Journeying or following a pathway: This aspect of identity

construction is grounded in the metaphor of an individual piece
of thread or yarn as it extends through a piece of cloth. As
such, identity is understood as an evolving journey and is
expressed when authors explore, weigh, challenge, expand, or
alter their stances across time on those individual topics
appearing within their blogs. Bloggers travel along connected
paths through their lives which take on the richness of
personal or historical narratives. Over weeks, months or years,
they tell tales arising from their jobs, travels, projects, and
other activities. They look back on what has happened to them
and forward to what might occur. They explain their motivations
 Threaded Identity 14

and offer interpretations of the behaviors of others. Weblogs

enable their authors to share ongoing personal narratives of
daily and seasonal life in ways which no other cyberspatial
form allows.

• Spinning: This sense of identity construction employs the

metaphor of the physical overlap of individual fibers in a
thread or piece of yarn. Identity is conceived here as an
ongoing process of construction across both time and space, one
in which an author draws out and twists together a multi-
layered, overlapping set of concerns, beliefs, and engagements
among the postings. Identity resides in that polyphonic stream
of related positions which are shared in cyberspace. Hence,
some authors adopt identities as experts and demonstrate their
right to this role by performing it repeatedly and in public to
the satisfaction of their readers. Other authors may be quite
new to an identity and invite their audience to travel with
them as they explore tentatively what their developing
individuality may entail. Readers serve as intimate witnesses
to the spinning of an identity's composite fibers. In a
modernist framework, identity is a final achievement, a
completion which marks an individual's arrival at a fixed
destination. In a dialogical framework, spinning processes
involving identity are neither fixed nor final.

• Weaving a tapestry: Finally, identity construction extends

by analogy to the creation of a tapestry. Identity in this
sense is formed out of an author's decision to structure a
weblog with an array of personally-selected elements and themes
which invite readers to a conversation over the question "what
do you make of this author?" This metaphor -- admittedly an
extended meaning of threadedness -- comes closest to the
activities reflected in personal homepages by their emphasis on
the spatial distribution of elements.
Let me conclude by citing the intriguing 2002 BBC report
that women in Iran were turning to weblogs. The news analyst
indicated that "The web is providing a way for women in Iran to
talk freely about taboo subjects such as sex and boyfriends.
Over the past few months there has been a big jump in the
number of Persian weblogs which are providing an insight into a
closed society" (Hermida, 2002). Hermans (2001) argues that
cross-cultural psychologists need to focus particular attention
on contact zones internationally. The research reported here --
of weblogs and their potential to mirror dialogical processes
of identity development -- serves to reinforce his appeal and
should spur further efforts to understand the weblog's role in
 Threaded Identity 15

mediating identity within the human digital ecology across the

entire globe.
 Threaded Identity 16

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 Threaded Identity 17

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 Threaded Identity 19

Author Note

Vincent W. Hevern, Ph.D., Psychology Department, Le Moyne

College, Syracuse, NY 13214. The author can be contacted by

email at <hevern@lemoyne.edu>. An earlier version of this

paper was presented at the 2nd International Conference on the

Dialogical Self, Ghent, Belgium, October, 2002.

 Threaded Identity 20

Footnotes
1
A listing of all blogs employed in this study and their

associated Uniform Resource Locator addresses is available

from the author.

 Threaded Identity 21

Table 1

Structural Elements of Weblogs

______________________________________________________________

Textual (N = 25)
• Poetry & song lyrics
• Archive of past
• Press interviews, articles,
postings
citations
• Autobiographical
• Quotes and extracts from own
orienting statement
previous postings
• Blogs read: Listing &
• Reviews: Movies, music, books
links
• Coordinate & other
• Search engines
Weblog Technical specifications
personal sites: Links
Visual/Graphic (N = 13)
• Current & favorite
• "Look and Feel" Template
books & other reading
lists • Advertisements
• Disability or illness • Awards: Icons & links
story • Contribution links (PayPal,
• Editorial writing: Amazon Honor System, etc.)
Essays on culture,
communications media, etc.
• Icons: Weblogs & other sites

• Family & friends: Links

• Personal artwork & drawings
& biographical sketches • Photographs: Family &
partners
• FAQ (Frequently Asked
Questions) • Photographs: Friends
• Favorite online sites • Photographs: General images
(travel, etc.)
• Fictional writing
• Hobbies & personal
• Photographs: News events
interest resources • Photographs: Self
• ISSN number • Public service announcements
• Journals & diaries • Web page counter: Icon & link
• Monthly calendar: • Webcam
Hypertext linked to Interactive (N = 8)
archives • Announcement list for future
• Music: Favorite album news/updates
lists • Contact: Email address
• Online resource • Contact: IM/ICQ address
directories
 Threaded Identity 22

• Personal homepages of • Guestbook

others
• Online discussion list (blog-
• Personal preference & specific)
interest inventories
• Online store or commercial
• PGP Public Key Block sales center
(Encryption Code Key)
• Polls
• Wish lists (e.g., Amazon.com)
______________________________________________________________

Table 2

Element-Activity Analysis of Main Channel Postings

Self Focused

• "100 Things About…" Self-Description List:

Highlighting disparate elements of the self

• Diary-like Narrative: Describing, detailing daily

life, business, & professional activities in time

• Diary-like Self-Colloquy: Talking to the self aloud,

reflecting, musing
"Other" Focused

• Aggregated Links: Constructing or reporting an event

or concern via multiple sources

• Allusive Comment/Veiled Reference & Link:

Challenging the reader to go offsite

• Correspondence/Email with Annotation or Commentary:

Exchanging viewpoints

• Link & Annotation: Describing, summarizing

• Link & Commentary: Evaluating, judging

• Quotation & Commentary: Evaluating, judging

• Research Results: Summarizing an active inquiry for

personal or professional purposes
Dual Focused
 Threaded Identity 23

• Embedded Image: Illustrating, contexualizing