Social Media and Identity - Essay Example

In this modern information and technology age, community is one of the most misused words with a community for virtually every context one can think of.  Any collection of people with a physical or virtual connection ascribes to the term, which is why there are university, customer, academic, professional, user, and even Facebook communities (Zhang, Hao and John 67). Theoretically, identity has can be described by two theories namely the social identity and the identity theory. The social identity theory is founded on the concept that one’s social category to which they belong provides them with the answer to the question, who am I? This serves to supply both a basis for similarity and uniqueness, for example, someone may say I am a sociologist (Zhang, Hao and John 68). By virtue of this identity communicates what they do and group themselves with other people who share the particular ideology while at the same time distinguishing themselves from people outside this circle.

Nonetheless, despite the desire to be unique people also have another overriding desire to fit in with the larger community and not be constantly part of a minority. For example, an immigrant from a Hispanic community coming to the US may at first try to cling to their ethnic identity and primary even on social media maintaining links with friends with whom they share a common race and language. This is demonstrated in the fact that they may update their status in their mother tongue and by so doing precluding “outsiders”. Nonetheless, the virtual identity must reflect the physical one at some point, as a result, if one is part of a minority and they only socialize with their own, their circles are likely to be very small. Consequently, even the Hispanic visitor will realize at some point that the online friends can only provide so much company eventually identify with his real neighbors even if they are from a different social group (Kushin and Kelin).  This results in one slowly trying to integrate themselves into the dominant community albeit still holding on to their ethnic roots. One may discover, for example, that if they moved from say; Venezuela into the US, maintaining social media posts in Spanish might result in their feeling locked out of the communal life in their new country.  Social media is after all a reflection of life experiences, young people will go to parties and tweet about it, and they will update what they read on the news as well as a variety of contemporary real-time issues that play out in their immediate environment.

Therefore, when one’s social media experience does not reflect their life experiences, one is bound to be lonely in real life and could even feel depressed.  Being a member of a minority group may be a good thing in that one has distinctive uniqueness but it does not protect one from loneliness and sometimes discrimination. To cope, one group has to make adjustments to fit into the other and in most cases, the minorities are forced to do so or feel left out.  On the other hand, one may choose to use social media to address their minority challenges in closed groups for members of their specific community but in socializing with everyone else in real life. This way they can deal with race and ethnicity issues exclusively with those who can relate while at the same time fitting into the global culture. 

Conclusion
In conclusion, social media is indeed an effective platform for minority groups to address their issues in isolation safe from the consequences of discussing “taboo” topics”. Nonetheless, it also provides a platform for cultural integration where these minorities can also interact with the dominant cultures as part of their integration. Isolation has been proved a potentially dangerous thing since it can result in depression and sometimes even self-destructive action such as suicide (Bearman and James 89). Therefore, even when using social media to “insulate” one’s self from the mainstream culture, one should ensure they make an effort to fit in with their immediate neighbors irrespective of their ethnicity.