The European Conference on Educational Research was held in Vienna this year and bought together over 2000  people and 27 networks to share their work. As part of the programme we ran a small research workshop (under the VETnet strand) with the aim of exploring key themes and issues surrounding digital identities that are of relevance to practitioners working in education. The slides below provide a brief overview of the session:

There was a real mix of participants from across Europe (and beyond), including Italy, Finland, Greece, UK, Australia, and Hungary. This richness in nationalities immediately foregrounded what is an often overlooked dimension in discussions around digital identity – namely the impact of cultural difference. Different cultures both create and consume their [digital] identities in different ways. This was most keenly reflected in the shared conversations around where we perceive the boundary between our public and private lives. The mass use of social services such as Facebook can appear to have a homogenising effect, erasing cultural distinctions through normalised ’social-networking’ practices. Many of our participants felt that this was an area that would benefit from further empirical  research to, at the very least, expand our dominant Westernised perspectives of online identity.

Other key points that came back from the session were, in brief:

• An acceptance that in a connected global space, not only is it difficult to avoid having an online identity but that it is also advantageous to be proactive in managing it. Therefore the importance of teaching what we might call  digital identity literacy skills needs to be on the agenda at all sectoral levels;
• There must be more awareness raising and advocacy around the potential risks associated with the use of social media and the long term impact that digital tracks and traces can have on our online identities, for example in relation to career building and the job market;
• Rather than try to respond to fears around using the Internet by heavily monitoring and containing our online activity we should over time learn to accept the contradictions between the differing roles and perspectives that are presented by ourselves and others;
• Separating personal from professional activity is difficult, if not impossible to achieve. But do we really need to maintain this divide? We could not reach consensus on this issue and the debate circled around the question of aggregation versus compartmentalisation of online activities;
• Towards the end of the session someone asked “How should we interpret other people’s online presence?”. An interesting question suggesting that reading and interpreting online identities is in itself a skill.

It was a valuable session and we are grateful for the input of all those who attended and we hope that the person who at the end of the workshop declared “I do not want to have a digital identity as it makes me too nervous” has now overcome her anxieties.

Next on the agenda: we are looking forward to Online Educa Berlin ‘09 where will we take these issues forward into our symposium discussion session on (yes you guessed it)  ‘Digital Identity’.