Social Media has always been around; Just in different ways we might not have thought

 Introduction

What's up everyone! My name is Edward Kalinowski, but I go by Trent. I am a senior, and am going to be graduating this spring. I'm from New Braunfels, and I am a marketing major trying to get a minor in communications! 

Mead in todays society

Every single one of us have a sort of persona that we carry amongst ourselves. Some of us may think we are the cool guy/gal, the nerdy one, the in-betweener, the DUFF(if you have seen this movie you understand) and so on. How we think of ourselves is how we associate with people in our daily lives. This can be seen as the "I" in Mead. The "me" in Mead is how we think others look at us. These both co-exist and can have affects, good or bad, on our relationships in our day to day lives. I am guilty of letting the "I" spill over into the "me". I thought that I was always too cool to be vulnerable with people, and talk to people how I felt about sensitive issues. I thought of myself as someone who doesn't open up about things, being too cool to do such a thing. This eventually spilt over into how I thought people viewed me. I thought I was viewed as someone who wouldn't do such a thing, because I never had shown people that side of me. Every person you have ever met has a different opinion on who you are, and your personality. Most people want everyone to view them a certain and exact way, but that is simply impossible. 

Social Media before Social Media

Before the Social Media of today, there was social media of the past. I found this interesting, because before reading the text from Humphreys I had never thought of it this way. Before phones, people would write diaries. They would write who they hung out with that day, things about the weather, what they ate, and simple things like what they did in a day. They probably wrote about how much they despised having to literally work on the farm for 10 hours, just so they had something to eat at the end of the day. What I thought was cool is that people would write these diaries, and send them to their family members that live in another part of the country. This was so their family could have an understanding of what their life was like, what kind of people they were hanging around, where they worked, etc. This is social media before social media. We do the exact things, but with our phones. Of course diaries aren't on the same level as phones, but it's the most basic form of social media allowing us to communicate with others we don't see on a daily basis. Of course we have ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, but some of those are confusing to the naked eye and could take years to study. You need historical context, and a true understanding of Egyptian culture to truly get what the hieroglyphics were saying. With the diary you have the daily activities, which are more personable in my opinion. 

Conclusion

I feel like Mead had to have been used when it came to writing these diaries. I'm sure you weren't logging every little thing you did, because we always want to tell people about the good. We only tell the embarrassing to our very close circle. Sometimes we don't tell the embarrassing to anyone. Everyone has a view of themselves that may be different from what others think of them. When we describe things that happened throughout our day, we all have a different perspective. We may be pissed off that it rained because we left our car window open, but someone else may be happy because their garden finally got rain after a couple of weeks. While that doesn't have to do with Mead, it does show how differently situations can be viewed. Mead has existed long before social media. Social media only increased how much Mead impacts our interactions among each other. With instant news to and from your friends and family, it is much easier to shape who you want to be in their eyes. If you want to be seen as a pet person, you will post constantly about your pet. If you want to be seen as a partier, you will post yourself drinking or smoking. Some people don't care though, and will post absolutely everything. Would I ever post about the time I pee'd my pants in class in the fifth grade? Absolutely not, (Well technically I just did but that never happened) unless I wanted to be viewed as funny. But, if you are insecure about that incident you would never want the story to be heard by anyone. I'm sure we will talk about how insecurities shape how we act on social media, but for now I'm out. Peace!