BURNINGBIRD
a node at the edge  


June 10, 2002
MetabloggingCategorization and Identity

I tried an experiment yesterday: I organized my blogroll into different categories of webloggers, such as Really Scary Smart People, Huggables, Life Twisters, and so on.

The intention was to have a bit of fun, and also to hopefully encourage weblog readers into visiting these weblogs. One of the problems with blogrolls is that they're so uniform and so common we tend to ignore them. By categorizing my blogroll friends, I had hoped to make them all stand out a bit.

What I forgot with this little brain storm of mine is that categorizing a person is probably one of the most depersonalizing things you can do to another human being. My putting an individual in a category said to that person, this is how I view you. I told them, "Forget the richness of your voice, the strength of your personality, the warmth of your humor, and my regard, and yes even love for you. You are (pick one: a/b/c/...)."

I took each of my friends and flattened them into a cookie-cutter category, and then walked away dusting hands off, pleased at my own cleverness. There are times when the Bird screws the pooch, and this was surely one of those times.

AKMA's been talking about identity lately. In particular, he wrote the following:

    One of the complicating elements in our discussion of identity comes from our tendency to take the partial information we have about someone's identity as sufficient to envision his or her full identity.

Yesterday, I took one characteristic of each person and used this to form a basis for insertion into one category or another. By doing so I said to my weblog readers, "this weblogger is a Woman who Kicks Butt". I set the stage for that reader so that when they go to Shannon's weblog, they expect to see primarily a Woman who Kicks Butt. However, they may be shocked to see that the Woman who Kicks Butt is also a sensitive, accomplished and talented singer and songwriter, loyal friend, and highly complex and rich personality.

AKMA isn't "just" a Huggable, Really Scary Smart person - he's the one person who has broken through my deep distrust of Christians by showing that a Christian can have a sense of humor, can be tolerant, can love others regardless of their religious affiliation, and can have a deep moral integrity and loyalty that transcends any particular religious belief.

Chris isn't just a Life Twister or Unique or Huggable - though all three are part of him. He's an extremely caring person who believes strongly that we, as a people, can be better than how we see ourselves. When I think of him, I think of this person who wants to grab the world in a big bear hug, and then slap the world upside the head for all the idiotic things we do.

Sharon transcends Butt Kicker and Smart person and Artist, because she's a mother and student and a very good friend who is going to be the world's best librarian someday. Why? Because she has a deep love for books that goes beyond their material worth - to her words are gold, expressed thoughts diamonds.

I placed Jonathon into that old Australian Delegation classification, which removed any vestige of his personality, reducing him to nothing more than a citizen of a country. I disregarded the fact that when Jonathon writes about The Pillow Book or Tales of Genji, I want to curl up on the floor putting my head on my hands and just listen to the beauty of the words as they flow over and around me.

Dorothea is more than a Really Scary Smart Person or Woman who Kicks Butt. She wrote in the comments attached to the category posting:

    There's an interesting blog lurking in the experience, though, one AKMA might want to take a stab at. However much we try, we have limited control over how we are perceived by others. Our identities, if you will, are as dependent on the interpretation of others as is our writing on our readers.

    Perhaps it is not surprising, then, that BB's genial attempt to lend us personality led to difficulties. How many of us are entirely comfortable with the idea that our identities are not under our sole control?

Dorothea is an astute observer of humanity, with an incredible knack for cutting to the heart of the matter. She is, by far, richer than any one entry in any one category.

I am a neophyte in this new brave new world where we connect to others through the threaded void, but I am learning. I am learning.


Posted by Bb at June 10, 2002 09:59 AM




Comments

Hey, Bb, thanks for wisdom and pateince and boldness, and come back soon.

Posted by: AKMA on June 11, 2002 07:08 PM

Well, here I go again. With my big mouth. And why not. Shelley, you are being too hard on yourself. What you were reacting to when you launched this exercise WASN'T a conscious attempt to peg people into holes, it was a real, legitimate and important urge to bundle the growing number and tenors of voices here into meaningful (and humorous) bunches -- to make what is becoming an almost overwhelming array of options manageable. That's what you do, and I'd LOVE to see you do it. In other words, I've been saying we need some kind of "personal dashboard" (browser based) each of us can manipulate on our own desktop so that WE can categorize the bloggers we read into chunks that makes sense to us. How shallow would we have to be to assume that just because we're reading the adventures of a single mom we might not come across other qualities reflecting her depth? No, Shelley, you had the right idea and no, you didn't go to far--actually, you haven't gone far enough yet.

Is alphabetizing (as some do) or listing bloggers in order of importance in your life any less a method of categorizing?

Flap on, Bird. You had the right idea. Take it and run with it.

-jeneane

Posted by: jeneane on June 12, 2002 06:44 AM

P.S. -- a big one -- Shelley, if you don't do it, someone else who doesn't know us as well as you do will. It's a matter of time. Which would any of us rather have: The Bird watching out for us or the likes of MSNBC (who has started to do this with their own journalists--i read recently someplace.)

Posted by: jeneane on June 12, 2002 06:52 AM

Gee and I kind of liked being an artist.

Then again, maybe a really scary smart artist who kicks butt or at least those that from a long way off look like flies.

Perhaps you can create an auto-classification engine. Like those used for picking townhouse names: "fox brook haven" or "deer run hollow." Verbs, adjectives, nouns all tossed into a bucket awaiting a page load to spring forth with random categorization of log folk.

Posted by: Jerry on June 12, 2002 09:48 AM

Categorizing writers is indeed limiting and sometimes dehumanizing, but it one of the essential jobs of any literary critic. Categorical grids come and go, but the the ones that are really helpful tend to stick -- such as Romantic versus Neo-Classical, or even modern/postmodern. By the way, dehumanization is a big business, don't knock it.

Posted by: The Happy Tutor on June 12, 2002 04:06 PM

Gilligan : "Holy shit, Skipper, it's the Happy Tutor!"

Posted by: stavrosthewonderchicken on June 14, 2002 04:21 AM

I always know when Happy's been by - there's a sticky residue of cherry lollipop all over the page, and lip prints on my monitor.

Posted by: Bb aka Shelley aka Weblog Bosswoman on June 14, 2002 12:04 PM


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