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“i just like knowing they can look at it and relize who i really am”: Recognition and the Limits of Girlhood Agency on MySpace

In this article, we question the authorial digital agency that is often ascribed to queer girls by postfeminist empowerment rhetorics and feminist investments in queer subversiveness. Drawing on visual and textual analyses of lesbian- and queer-identified girls’ MySpace pages as well as interviews with girls conducted via instant messenger, we suggest that while girls insist that their digital self-presentations are simple reflections of who they really are, these selves are always produced through normative frameworks such as whiteness and heteronormative monogamy. We contend that discourses of recognition emerge throughout the content of girls’ pages and their own explanations of their online activities. Lesbian and queer girls must describe themselves within legible terms in order to be socially recognizable, and the subject’s fundamental desire for recognition negates the possibility of any completely autonomous, unmediated self-presentation. Elucidating girls’ desire for recognition illustrates the limited range of possible subjectivities available to girls under postfeminism and hegemonic white consumption ideals.