Chernoff2014

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Chernoff2014
BibType ARTICLE
Key Chernoff2014
Author(s) Nathalie Chernoff, Sue Widdicombe
Title ‘I was bored so…’: motivational accounts of participation in an online emo group
Editor(s)
Tag(s) Membership Categorization Analysis, Youth, subcultures, Online Interaction, Conversation Analysis
Publisher
Year 2015
Language English
City
Month
Journal Journal of Youth Studies
Volume 18
Number 3
Pages 305–321
URL Link
DOI 10.1080/13676261.2014.944115
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

We examine members' spontaneous accounts for joining and participating in an online emo forum. The Internet and social networking sites are central features of contemporary youth cultures; the analysis of interaction on emo forums can thus provide a way of appreciating emo as a ‘Community in Practice’. We analyse popular discussion threads collected from a key emo website, using membership categorisation and conversation analysis. In these threads, members introduce themselves and account for joining and posting pictures in response to a prior request to do so. Analysis shows that newbies establish their emo attributes and hence entitlement to participate while dismissing emo-related motivation for joining the forum, claiming instead a desire to relieve boredom. Participants similarly accounted for posting photos of themselves and for producing fan pics as due to boredom. We show how claiming to be bored allows members to engage with the group while negotiating potentially problematic inferences that attend subcultural membership. We conclude that our approach provides a useful methodology for furthering our understanding of an important aspect of contemporary youth subcultures.

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