Reading Social Media

 

Photo by Jakob Owens on Unsplash

READING SOCIAL MEDIA

Social media is any “form of electronic communication (such as websites for social networking and microblogging) through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (such as videos),” according to Merriam-Webster. This means that social media posts range from a variety of lengths across a variety of sites. Some social media platforms include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, TikTok, and Reddit. The following questions will help you to understand this new form of communication and think critically about the posts that you view on the social media platforms that you are a part of.

Who created the social media post?

The author is very important, because some people are social media influencers whereas some are not. The post by a social media influencer will reach more people than the every-day post of your neighbor Julie, and therefore will be tailored to a larger audience. You will also more often than not have a real-life relationship with the person whose post you are reading when it comes to those every-day people, so you should always take into account the information that you know about them in order to understand what their post is trying to say. Things such as their political background, family situation, age, hobbies, and religion can all directly influence the messages they choose to convey.

Which platform did the author choose to use?

While Facebook tends to have an older audience and relies a lot more on supporting text or text alone for all of its posts, a medium such as Snapchat tends to have a much younger audience and relies a lot more on photos than on the supporting text. It is rare to see an uncaptioned photo on Facebook, whereas on Snapchat it’s very common to receive photos out of context. How did the author choose to use the platform? If they posted something to their personal account in a way so that all their followers, and even people of the public, can view it, they may want to reach a broader audience. There is a certain permanence to those posts, because they will stay up unless the author takes them down, and so they will be more thought-through, aesthetically pleasing, and likely document an event or represent a part of their identity. If the author chose to post to their story instead, those posts tend to be of a moment, more fleeting, less composed, and can only be saved for longer than 24 hours if the author specifically chooses to archive the post.

Does the post include any pictures?

If the post was made on a social media site that favors photos over text, such as Instagram and Snapchat, the picture may be the primary means to communicate the emotion of the post. If, however, the post was made on Facebook or Twitter, the text itself may be the primary means of interpreting what the picture is trying to say. It’s important to also consider whether or not the photograph matches the caption. It might be a beautiful photo of the moon at sunset, paired with a caption that has nothing to do with the moon. In that instance, the picture supports the text and it is important to consider why the author would have chosen it to accompany their post. What is the subject matter, and how could it symbolically relate to or even produce the thoughts expressed in the caption?

Does the post include any hashtags or tags?

Hashtags link the post to global movements or like-minded individuals, and even movements such as #metoo and #blm. Tags link the post to individuals who might be part of the memory, or who the author might particularly like to share their post with. Hashtags and tags can help reveal the desired audience, as well as the intent of the post.