For this week’s reading, I did a critical media analysis on “The Initial Ask” by Aziz Ansari. The key term I chose from this reading is phone self. According to Aziz, “phone self is defined by whatever it is you communicate onto the other person’s screen” (47-48).

In this age and time, our cellphones are big part of our lives and how we act when using our phones to communicate might not necessarily match how we act in the real world. By having this extra barrier between us and the other person we are communicating with, sometimes we feel more comfortable or braver to say things we would never say in-person, whether it be because we do not want to see how the person reacts, how their voice might sound in a response, etc. However, even though many people find this way of communication easier and more convenient, not everyone likes what others become when they use their phone.

In this video above, we see some sons who have volunteered to allow their mothers to go through their phones. Most millennials I know, including myself rarely let other people look through their phones. In a Vanity Fair article, Aziz Ansari mentions that your most intimate relationship is with your phone, and I agree. You may not have any scandalous things on your phone, but you can tell a lot about a person from their phone: who they talk to, what do they talk about, what do they look at, what kind of apps they use, etc. In the video, a lot of these mothers are shocked and appalled to see what their sons text their dates or girlfriends. How the sons speak to their partners through their phone is not going to be the same as when they speak to their partners in-person.

Everyone texts differently depending on who is the recipient, but you can also act differently with the same person offline and online. This idea that you can say things you would never say in-person is an idea that we have been talking about throughout the semester. Also, I think this key term can be used in the other contexts that we have spoken of, like communicating via a computer or laptop. It can be any digital medium, not just a cellphone. In the context of online/phone dating, you are technically not anonymous, but there is no guarantee that you are who you say you are or the way you message is the same way you talk in-person. However, when you are your “computer self”, you can be anonymous, and some people take advantage of that. Some people post negative comments, some take on different identities to see what it feels like (identity tourism) , etc. All of the discussions we have had about our readings have pointed to the fact that we have two selves, a real world self and a digital self.