You and Your Profile

Identity After Authenticity

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Pub Date 04 May 2021 | Archive Date 11 Aug 2021

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Description

More and more, we present ourselves and encounter others through profiles. A profile shows us not as we are seen directly but how we are perceived by a broader public. As we observe how others observe us, we calibrate our self-presentation accordingly. Profile-based identity is evident everywhere from pop culture to politics, marketing to morality. But all too often critics simply denounce this alleged superficiality in defense of some supposedly pure ideal of authentic or sincere expression.

This book argues that the profile marks an epochal shift in our concept of identity and demonstrates why that matters. You and Your Profile blends social theory, philosophy, and cultural critique to unfold an exploration of the way we have come to experience the world. Instead of polemicizing against the profile, Hans-Georg Moeller and Paul J. D’Ambrosio outline how it works, how we readily apply it in our daily lives, and how it shapes our values—personally, economically, and ethically. They develop a practical vocabulary of life in the digital age. Informed by the Daoist tradition, they suggest strategies for handling the pressure of social media by distancing oneself from one’s public face. A deft and wide-ranging consideration of our era’s identity crisis, this book provides vital clues on how to stay sane in a time of proliferating profiles.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Hans-Georg Moeller is a professor of philosophy at the University of Macau. His Columbia University Press books include The Philosophy of the Daodejing (2006) and The Moral Fool: A Case for Amorality (2009).

Paul J. D’Ambrosio is a fellow at the Institute of Modern Chinese Thought and Culture and associate professor of Chinese philosophy and dean of the Center for Intercultural Research at East China Normal University in Shanghai. He is the coauthor, with Hans-Georg Moeller, of Genuine Pretending: On the Philosophy of the Zhuangzi (Columbia, 2017).

More and more, we present ourselves and encounter others through profiles. A profile shows us not as we are seen directly but how we are perceived by a broader public. As we observe how others...


Advance Praise

"What is your profile on social media? More likely, you manage several. Read Moeller and D'Ambrosio for insightful observations about the new problem of curating identity. In contrast to pre-modern sincerity aligning self to external role and modernity’s problem of authenticity as expression of the 'true self,' they give us profilicity. "

--David Stark, author of The Performance Complex Competition and Competitions in Social Life

"What is your profile on social media? More likely, you manage several. Read Moeller and D'Ambrosio for insightful observations about the new problem of curating identity. In contrast to pre-modern...


Available Editions

EDITION Paperback
ISBN 9780231196017
PRICE $30.00 (USD)

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Featured Reviews

This was a really interesting book as a media psychologist who studies identity and social media. I think more and more people like authenticity and the idea that anyone can just become a tiktok star or go viral on Twitter. This book is so much more though it's really at the root of perception online. Highly recommend.

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Anyone who likes Joseph Campbell's books will surely appreciate this book. Thought provoking, fascinating look into personality, profiles, and our life "On Line."
Though interesting, at times a dry read, but the payoff and knowledge by the time your done reading, are worth it. Thought Provoking.

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Receiving a free ARC of this book, "You and Your Profile" for my honest opinion. It was a dry read, cut and dry and I liked some of the thought. I may have brain fog, but I could not really get into the book as a read it through in one sitting.

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