(Inspired by multiple questions.)

I, just like every other person ever, is a part of many cultures. I’m a Jew, a woman, an American, a student, an American-English speaker, a reader, a writer, a traveler, an internet-user…I could go on. Each of the things I specifically chose to mention have at least one culture, if not many, many sub-cultures.

And each culture has it’s own rules, habits, in-jokes, and unspoken rules to navigate. I won’t make a joke about Chekov’s gun when chatting with friends in my business minor, but you can be sure I’ll mention it when I’m talking with my friends in the media studies department.

People switch between cultures all the time. As part of an average day I’ll be within the general student culture when I’m at my classes, I’ll be part of the Jewish culture when I eat my kosher lunch, I’ll be part of the feminist culture when I argue about objectification in some classroom text, I’ll be an American-English speaker when I tease my friend about her pronunciation of “about.”

Of course, it could be argues that these are small switches, most of them between cultures that have no real conflicts. I think that people are stronger in certain cultures than they are in others, but I also think that much of culture conflict is exacerbated by people referring to the “other.” I always strongly maintain that most people are more similar than they are different, but it’s always the surface differences that tend to come first when we judge other people and when we introduce ourselves.

I’m getting a little bit abstract, so I want to try to use myself as an example. When I was born, my parents gave me four names (and a family name.) “Jacqueline Anne,” the name I use in college, and work and internships. I typically refer to it as my English name, and I respond to it, and I’m totally comfortable using it.

But in Hebrew, my names is “Chana Yocheved.” (Yocheved = Jacqueline, Chana = Anne). And when I introduce myself in synagogue, or in a specifically Jewish context, that is the name I use. It’s mostly a practical decision – it’s not fair to ask everyone to remember all four names for me, even though I self-identify with all of them. It’s also pretty difficult for a lot of my friends to pronounce the Hebraic “Ch” sound, which is similar to a Spanish “J,” and is pretty guttural for English speakers.

It means, though, that I have a very real line dividing me between two of my cultures. And for some people it becomes a very Big Deal. I personally find it pretty funny, and I’m always happily surprised when two of my friends from different contexts figure out that they both know me.

But I’m essentially the same opinionated geeky me, no matter what you call me. I like creature comforts like curling up in blankets on cold days, and I love my family more than anything, and I love hanging out with my friends.  I love writing out all of my names, because they’re all mine.

So in the real world, I don’t really see myself moving between cultures in th same way, I guess. I have the same facebook page for everyone who knows me (you can look me up to confirm) and I don’t really feel this whole “dichotomy of cultures.”

But then, you have my internet persona.

Online I have my username, which is actually a fandom-specific name I came up with years ago, and have basically stuck with every since. You could trace me across multiple sites with the same name. And there, I actually do only project certain aspects of myself. Online, I’m American, and I’m a woman, (I’m careful to use gender-neutral pronouns for myself these days, but I think it’s obvious). I won’t even acknowledge my real name online, and I generally stick with purely fandom-related posts and topics. I have a lot of different interests, of course, but for the online culture(s) I’m a part of, I make a personal split between what belongs online and what doesn’t.

And that is weird, sometimes. I often wish I had more friends in real life that I could talk fandom-related stuff with, because then I could be 100% myself all the time. As it stands, I have to consciously hold myself back sometimes on my blog from chatting about certain things.

But again, it’s not that I am anything less than myself. My writing style and opinions and whatnot don’t change very much. It’s just that I’ve created a truncated version of myself for online interactions – I love using the internet to socialize with people who share my interests. But I am fully aware of how much they could be lying to me, so I choose not to reveal my whole self. It’s the only place where I actually feel the transition to another culture.

But I’ve been noticing more and more that people are more lax about hiding identity online. With different journalistic integrity issues coming up as bloggers become a more reliable (to a certain extent) news resource, a lot more people are revealing their names so that they will be trusted. And there’s something else to consider as well – with modern technology, my “secret identity” is as secret as other people care to make it. Track my IP address for long enough and people would be able to track me to New York, to Queens College, to my apartment. I’m sure my computer is hack-able. So is the wave of the future one where another “culture split” is doomed to fall? Some of the stuff I’ve read (both fiction and non-fiction) seem to think so. And of course, some don’t. (Like, oh, Ender’s Game? I suppose we’ll have a more in-depth discussion when we get there…)