Conference Program: Jewish Languages and Contemporary Hebrew

Conference on Jewish Languages and Contemporary Hebrew

University of Haifa

Sunday, 29 December 2013

For program (in Hebrew), click here.

Cite: Brandes and Levin, Israeli Teenage Girls Constructing Their Social Connections on Facebook

Brandes, Sigal Barak and David Levin. “‘Like My Status’: Israeli Teenage Girls Constructing Their Social Connections on the Facebook Social Network.” Feminist Media Studies (online preview)

URL:  http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14680777.2013.833533

Abstract

This paper engages with the relatively new area of research into teenage girls and online social networks, focusing on the experiences and views of Israelis. In particular, we examine how Israeli girls construct social relationships on Facebook. Adopting a feminist interpretive approach, this qualitative study is based on focus group interviews with Israeli girls aged between twelve and eighteen from diverse cultural, economic, and social backgrounds. The girls clearly distinguish between different circles of social closeness on Facebook, with each circle marked by different relationships, dynamics, and expectations. The study’s findings beg the question of whether social networks allow Israeli girls to exercise control, power, choice, and agency in their social world, or whether they remain informed by existing social structures that shape and restrict their choices and actions. The significance of these findings is discussed in the contexts of feminism, girl power, and Neoliberal discourse.