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Gay employees on social media: Strategies to portray professionalism

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  • Lucas Amaral Lauriano

    (LEM - Lille économie management - UMR 9221 - UA - Université d'Artois - UCL - Université catholique de Lille - Université de Lille - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

Abstract

This study explores how gay male employees represent themselves on social media. Research shows that online self-representations vary according to imagined audiences and platforms' affordances, but little is known about the possible roles of work in this process. In a qualitative study based on interviews and observations in the Brazilian subsidiary of a multinational automaker, I show how employees' assessment of compatibility between professionalism and homosexuality leads them to adopt different strategies on Facebook and Instagram, platforms where work and other spheres of their lives overlap. These behaviors are dynamic, occurring in a process I label "testing the waters": The gay men observe visible audiences' reactions and change their online self-representations in response to these reactions. This study shows how worried, conscious, and strategic LGBTQIA+ employees are about their use of social media, in new spaces that reproduce old workplace pressures.

Suggested Citation

  • Lucas Amaral Lauriano, 2023. "Gay employees on social media: Strategies to portray professionalism," Post-Print hal-04130785, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04130785
    DOI: 10.1093/jcmc/zmad001
    as

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