Negotiating Intimacy through Social Media

Abstract

In Iran, social media platforms have become powerful tools for political and interpersonal communication. They open new ways for their users, particularly women, to negotiate their intimate relationships with their family, (potential) partners or friends. Intimacy online is usually achieved through reciprocal visual and textual self-disclosure, which in turn may lead to face-to-face encounters. For Muslim Iranian women, social media allows room for self-expression, a way to combat loneliness and create meaningful relationships with like-minded people. However, at the same time, women are confronted by a number of risks associated with social media interaction in Iran, such as censorship, online (sexual) harassment, or cybercrime. Based on in-depth interviews and participant observation with Muslim Iranian women in Tehran, this paper explores the extent to which social media platforms (blogs, Facebook and dating sites) have created both challenges and opportunities for them by transforming the ways in which they create and maintain intimate relationships online.