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ERIC Number: EJ959301
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012
Pages: 19
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1057-0314
EISSN: N/A
Home Is Where the Heart Is: Facebook and the Negotiation of "Old" and "New" during the Transition to College
Stephenson-Abetz, Jenna; Holman, Amanda
Western Journal of Communication, v76 n2 p175-193 2012
This study adopts a dialectical perspective to explore how students transitioning to college communicatively negotiate the web of old and new relationships in the age of Facebook. Interpretive thematic analysis of 30 interviews revealed three discursive struggles: preservation and (re)invention, uniqueness and conformity, and openness and closedness. With time and space no longer inhibiting a connection to all the people in our relational lives, college students must make sense of the possibility for new senses of self when connected to "home" in a way previous generations never experienced. The contradictions present in the participants' voices illuminate the ways in which wider cultural discourses that construct college as a time of separation and independence enable and constrain students' understandings of their own emerging adulthood.
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A