Twitter's Role in Subcultures

A Critical Analysis of a Digital Research

The purpose of this essay is to analyse the article: “The sexual use of Social Networking site: The case of Pup Twitter” as an example of digital research. The author of the article, Liam Wignall, has conducted a research based on a qualitative and narrative research method. First, I will review the article by focusing on the key points of the argument, main ideas and conclusions. After that, I will examine the study, by highlighting the method that was used to collect and analyse the data, the positive and negative aspects of the inquiry and whether the conclusions of the author are accurate and concise. Finally, I will cite an existing work of other authors to identify some limitations in the study of the author.

The author of the article, Liam Wignall, focuses on how Twitter is used for developing a sexual subculture known ‘pup play’. This subculture is an eccentric sexual activity where participants assume a submissive role, they behave as a ‘dog’ and wear a ‘puppy mask’.

The research points out how sexual communities use online platforms to create a online community which, simultaneously allows them to promote offline society. Wignall named these kind of web sites as socio-sexual networking sites (SSNS) since they allow members to communicate online and at the same time undertake offline encounters, such as events, meetings and parties. Moreover, the article indicates that sexual subculture communities utilise Social Networking Sites (SNS) such as Twitter, instead of using existing Social-Sexual Network Sites (SSNS)

Regarding the data used in the research, it comes from interviews. Most of them took place in a ‘coffee shop’ or university campus, six of the meetings were done via Skype. The people interviewed were 26 participants who practiced ‘pup play’, gays and bisexuals, between 18-35 years old, based in United Kingdom. The author applies a qualitive and narrative approach to analyse the investigation and also a symbolic interactionist was used by the researcher.

In addition, Wignall focuses on the motives of why the members of the pup play choose Twitter to be in contact with each other, why they prefer Twitter to be part of the pup play community and they also pointed out the advantages and disadvantages of online communities.

In conclusion, Wignall indicates the main motives of the use of Twitter by a sexual subculture; Twitter, as a public platform allows people to search for other individuals with same interest.. Also Twitter allows them to protect their identities by locking accounts. Moreover, most of the members prefer Twitter due the characteristics of the platform, for instance the character limit, the option of having multiple accounts and the opportunity to have private and public conversations.

Evaluation of the article

The article begins with a brief explanation of the inquiry, in which the author becomes repetitious in the affirmation that online platforms encourage offline communities to foster development and also become enabled to communicate with each other.

The author used a qualitive research method, based on One-on-One interviews in which he often conducted a personal interview and in some cases the interviews were conducted via Skype. The researcher interviewed 26 people in total, they were between 18-35 years old, based in the United Kingdom, were of Caucasian descent, who participate in puppy play.It may have been more accurate for the study to use an online survey since it allows to reach more people by sending it across the world. Moreover online questionnaire enable the Researcher to contact people from various backgrounds and ages.

Regarding all the data collected and presented in the study, it is clear that the author analysed the data properly since the article responds to the focus of the investigation by pointing out the reasons of members of pup play community using Twitter to be in contact with each other and the reason of Twitter getting utilised to develop offline communities as pup play groups. However, the discussion of the data analysed is extensive and the author has cited numerous other authors, it might have been clearer and concise if the study had been summarised. .

The data were analysed by using The Grounded Theory Method (GTM) comprising a systematic, inductive and comparative approach for conducting inquiry for the purpose of constructing of the theoretical conduct (Charmaz, 2006; Charmaz & Henwood, 2007) Emerging codes were developed into focused codes. However, the inquiry could have been more accurate and informative if the author had incorporated more material. For instance , other researchers, have included in the inquiry the experiences of the soldiers in Vietnam War, different types of data, including interviews, memoirs and historical materials (Corbin, Strauss, 2008)

Overall, this article, in spite of being extensive, is not concise and contains several references from other authors. The research has analysed the data in the proper way by focusing on the purpose of the study. However, since the author has adopted a narrative method to approach the case, it may have been more accurate for the investigation if the researcher included further material, as observations, online surveys and more interviews.