Reclaiming agency in the digital neighborhood: an
ethnographic exploration of ethno-religious minority
youths’ performances of the masculine self

Reclaiming agency in the digital neighborhood: an
ethnographic exploration of ethno-religious minority
youths’ performances of the masculine self

affordances, masculinity, self-presentation, social media, youth

Self-presentation has been identified as a key practice within digital youth cultures. The scholarship on youths’ self-presentation has extensively
investigated how young people negotiate affordances in ways that optimally support their transitions into adulthood. However, the scholarship’s

focus on identity development and technological affordances risks constructing a homogeneous, de-contextualized, and media-centric represen-
tation of digital youth cultures. To unveil how self-presentation practices are embedded within a broader socio-cultural context, I conducted a

15-month hybrid ethnographic study with 23 ethno-religious minority young men living in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. The
observations illustrate that these young men attempt to reclaim agency over their identity representations by performing “masculine ideals” of
the self in response to racialized discourses. Overall, the results underscore the necessity of adopting an intersectional perspective that considers
the interplay between self-presentation on social media and the threats and opportunities within youths’ (digital) neighborhoods.

Tom De Leyn

https://doi.org/10.1093/jcmc/zmad037

31 August 2023

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