Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their
linguistic accommodation

k 2019

Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation

KOVÁČOVÁ, Dominika

Základní údaje

Originální název

Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation

Autoři

KOVÁČOVÁ, Dominika (703 Slovensko, garant, domácí)

Vydání

6th IDEAS English Students' Conference, English Students' Club, 10 May 2019, The Department of English and American Studies, Masaryk University, Brno, 2019

Další údaje

Jazyk

angličtina

Typ výsledku

Prezentace na konferencích

Obor

60203 Linguistics

Stát vydavatele

Česká republika

Utajení

není předmětem státního či obchodního tajemství

Odkazy

URL

Kód RIV

RIV/00216224:14210/19:00109678

Organizační jednotka

Filozofická fakulta

Klíčová slova česky

informality; social media; communication accommodation theory

Klíčová slova anglicky

informalita; sociální média; teorie komunikační akomodace

Štítky

rivok

Příznaky

Mezinárodní význam, Recenzováno

Změněno: 31. 3. 2020 11:14, Mgr. Marie Skřivanová

Anotace

V originále

The emergence of influencers, otherwise referred to as digital celebrities or superusers, who manage to build a large and loyal following owing to their captivating performance is considered one of the most important milestones in the Web 2.0 environment. In order to become successful online and attract as many users as possible, the preliminary findings of my research suggest that these digital celebrities accommodate to the language of their target audience and assume the role of their friend and lifestyle guru. While the power of influencers is visible on multiple social media platforms, this paper focuses on the language of Instagram, where their impact is potentially the strongest as the majority of Instagram users is formed by Millennials. These actively participate in social media trends and represent a highly influential group of consumers. Language-wise, Millennials are often accused of disrupting the norms of written language and their linguistic performance is typically described as too informal. Since informality is one of the most characteristic features of youth talk, this research presents itself as a pilot study of informality on Instagram, a predominantly visual social media platform with an inconspicuous textual element. More importantly, this project aims to identify the status of informality on Instagram and the extent to which it is appropriated by influencers in textual and visual modes. The analytical data consist of posts that have been extracted from Instagram profiles of three influencers with comparable number of followers and scanned for any recurrent features of informality. Inspired by the communication accommodation theory, this paper argues that Instagram influencers linguistically converge to their audience by adopting features of informality and thus challenge the (unwritten) norms of what level of informality is acceptable online.

Návaznosti

MUNI/A/1396/2018, interní kód MU

Název: Researching Communication in English: Paradigms, Strategies, Developments (Akronym: RCE)

Investor: Masarykova univerzita, Researching Communication in English: Paradigms, Strategies, Developments, DO R. 2020_Kategorie A - Specifický výzkum - Studentské výzkumné projekty

Citovat

KOVÁČOVÁ, Dominika. Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation. In 6th IDEAS English Students' Conference, English Students' Club, 10 May 2019, The Department of English and American Studies, Masaryk University, Brno. 2019.

@proceedings{1531716,
   author = {Kováčová, Dominika},
   booktitle = {6th IDEAS English Students' Conference, English Students' Club, 10 May 2019, The Department of English and American Studies, Masaryk University, Brno},
   keywords = {informalita; sociální média; teorie komunikační akomodace},
   language = {eng},
   title = {Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation},
   url = {https://www.phil.muni.cz/en/all-events/4001-sesta-anglisticka-studentska-konference-ideas},
   year = {2019}
}

TY  - CONF
ID  - 1531716
AU  - Kováčová, Dominika
PY  - 2019
TI  - Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation
KW  - informalita
KW  - sociální média
KW  - teorie komunikační akomodace
UR  - https://www.phil.muni.cz/en/all-events/4001-sesta-anglisticka-studentska-konference-ideas
L2  - https://www.phil.muni.cz/en/all-events/4001-sesta-anglisticka-studentska-konference-ideas
N2  - The emergence of influencers, otherwise referred to as digital celebrities or superusers, who manage to build a large and loyal following owing to their captivating performance is considered one of the most important milestones in the Web 2.0 environment. In order to become successful online and attract as many users as possible, the preliminary findings of my research suggest that these digital celebrities accommodate to the language of their target audience and assume the role of their friend and lifestyle guru. While the power of influencers is visible on multiple social media platforms, this paper focuses on the language of Instagram, where their impact is potentially the strongest as the majority of Instagram users is formed by Millennials. These actively participate in social media trends and represent a highly influential group of consumers. Language-wise, Millennials are often accused of disrupting the norms of written language and their linguistic performance is typically described as too informal. Since informality is one of the most characteristic features of youth talk, this research presents itself as a pilot study of informality on Instagram, a predominantly visual social media platform with an inconspicuous textual element. More importantly, this project aims to identify the status of informality on Instagram and the extent to which it is appropriated by influencers in textual and visual modes. The analytical data consist of posts that have been extracted from Instagram profiles of three influencers with comparable number of followers and scanned for any recurrent features of informality. Inspired by the communication accommodation theory, this paper argues that Instagram influencers linguistically converge to their audience by adopting features of informality and thus challenge the (unwritten) norms of what level of informality is acceptable online.
ER  -

KOVÁČOVÁ, Dominika. Informality on social media : Instagram influencers and their linguistic accommodation. In \textit{6th IDEAS English Students' Conference, English Students' Club, 10 May 2019, The Department of English and American Studies, Masaryk University, Brno}. 2019.

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