For Women, Social Media Is More Than "girl Talk"
A few months ago, I wrote about how social media presents women with increased opportunities for influence and professional development
. In the comments, I found a number of commenters (both men and women) who relegated women's interest in social media to superficial reasons like "girl talk" or women's natural abilities as "connectors." I pushed back against those characterizations because I thought they were too superficial and limiting only to have one commenter suggest that there was no shame in women's natural social skills.
Out of the almost 90 million female active Internet users in America, nearly 68 million of them are into social media, using Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and other websites as such. The natural born chatterbox-ness is certainly not the reason of them being so active on social platforms. There ought to be some other factors, besides the favoring conditions provided by the social media, contributing to women's zeal for the online connection.
Wominnovation
Women have a history of forming new languages. In 15th Century England for example, "yes" was replaced by "you" because of them. In mid 20th century, a group of young women from Oberwart had influenced an entire community to switch from Hungarian to German -- a breakthrough after 400 years. Even in California, the use of "like" and "ohmigod" was started by female. The combination of written and spoken languages used in social media today is also an invention by women.
One reason for women's interest in social media has to do with its symbolic capital, and what it represents in our culture. As language changes often signify underlying social change (think tutoiement in the French Revolution), people adopting emerging forms of communication like social media, are also embracing the consonant social identities. Social media represents an identity that is modern, connected, and a little bit daring. It's an identity that is understood to be comfortable with a certain amount of transparency, promotes information, and has a global outlook, as technology crosses geographic boundaries. It is participative in nature, and this opportunity to add new layers to their identities is part of what makes social media so attractive to women.
Apart from the cultural recognition, active presence on social platforms also helps improve their living standard. Social media is actually a tool for them to organize different areas in life, like job, family, networking, etc. What's more is the entertainment and fun one can get from it.
The benefits of social media is certainly not gender specific. But why is that the new form of communication is more welcomed by women than men? It is probably due to some alternations of the social context.
Social Media & Social Change
Sure, social media provides platforms for both men and women to voice their opinions, but being the dominants in most societies, men wouldn't need these new opportunities. The new portals are not really that "golden" in men's eyes since they have had enough channels to express their viewpoints. As for women, social media grants them the freedom they have never had to say what they want to say. Their interest, therefore, in social media is reasonable.
Understanding the underlying reasons for women's engagement with social media gives the discussion of women and emerging technologies an entirely new flavor. It's not about a communication style that is unique to women, nor is it based on some supposedly evolutionary instincts that women possess. It's about engaging women across the various layers of identity that they carry. Female consumers are not monolithic: they hail from diverse ethnic backgrounds and countries, have varied familial structures, do or don't have children, have a range of education levels, and share many other differentials. By recognizing women as complete people, and not just as limited stereotypes, and by understanding that their interest in emerging technologies is a reflection of the various aspects of their identities, is a useful starting point for organizations that hope to reach and engage women online. Now that's "girl talk" that I can get used to.
by: Queenie Ang
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