From individual affectedness to collective identity: personal testimony campaigns on social media and the logic of collection

Abstract

In recent years, there has been much debate about the consequences of the internet and social media for activism and social movements. According to Lance W Bennett and Alexandra Segerberg, digital activism involves a logic of ‘connective action’, in which collective action and collective identity lose importance. To assess the validity of this theory, I focus on personal testimony campaigns that have by now become a familiar digital tactic, especially in online mobilisations around issues of gender and sexuality. Drawing on discourse analysis of some of the most prominent examples, from #MeToo to #GirlsLikeUs, I argue that more than a logic of connection, what is at stake here is a ‘logic of collection’, involved in gathering personal testimonies as specimens of various grievances people are affected by (sexual harassment, discrimination, etc.). Aggregating personal testimonies around shared hashtags provides a means to construct and/or trasform the collective identity of the groups involved in order to raise their self-awareness and place them in a better position to engage in collective action. These practices thus suggest the need to overcome the opposition between personal and collective identity inherent in the theory of ‘connective action’, and refocus research on the forms of online identification that connect these two levels.