The way in which we curate ourselves, the person you are at work, with friends, at your parents’ house or online, these are all sides of ourselves that are parts of a whole. Multifaceted diverse and uncontainable.
The invention of Instagram established personal photo albums to be shared amongst friends, slowly inviting the rich and famous to share the world that was once only read in gossip magazines and late night tv.
In 2016 I created a vegan Instagram account called Merlin’s Moments. Highlighting the accessibility and affordability of being vegan locally at University of Wollongong and the greater Illawarra. Merlin’s Moments exposes one part of myself; my lifestyle choice that veins out into other parts of myself. I curated a sense of self by displaying a part of my every day in the most appealing way possible. Aiming to encourage and persuade people that being vegan can be easy and delicious, good for you and the world. “The identities an individual is able to publicly perform are shaped by the society
or the culture in which they live (Hall, 1996 in Pennington, 2018 p. 620).”
The niche ideology of veganism settles in sustainability activism and the utopian perspectives of globalisation, specifically the global village when using social media networks. “the globalisation of communication is seen as an agent of empowerment, education, democracy, and equality” (Shaughnessy, 2012 p. 461) Merlin’s Moments is founded on the ideas of aestheticism that Instagram so highly values. Beautiful images of delicious food prompting engagement with vegan menus, and sustainable practices locally and hopefully globally. Instagram uses the photograph “to convey a brief message … or merely to show affect” (Messe J, 2015, p.1824)
Instagram affords the use of image and video as an immediate and key engagement tool which is why aesthetics are important. Food and selfies are the most liked images and videos on the site, the algorithm loves to people please. “Instagram posts that include a face receive 38% more likes and 32% more comments than posts containing other types of content (Lindell A, Bakhshi et al., 2014, p. 601)
In 2016 when I began Merlin’s Moments, veganism was becoming increasingly popular and at that time trendy through movements such as Veganuary and Meatless Mondays (Barrett, E 2020). Since then the products and plant-based alternatives are now largely growing on our supermarket shelves. This was met with both good and bad reviews causing an uproar when meat eating customer’s accidently purchased meat alternatives. (Oh no you caused less harm for one day your world might end.)
“Yuck, I bought these, I didn’t realise they were meat free, they have been sat in the
freezer ever since”, said one disgruntled shopper.” (7 News, 2019)
Shoppers have been complaining that the packaging is misleading. Credit: AP/John Locher, (7 News, 2019) available at <https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/food/shoppers-outraged-over-misleading-vegan-meat-product-labelling-c-171612>
The power of Instagram lay in its use of algorithms and hashtags much like Twitter. Allowing people to follow hashtags to see categorised images to their liking. The act of following other influences, maintaining a consistent post schedule and comment engagement are also crucial to gather a following of like-minded individuals and those interested in what you’re presenting. Social media platforms are structured in a particular fashion, with “invocations to participation” prioritising particular forms of participation linked to accompanying commercial goals (Burgess, 2014; also see Gillespie, 2010 in Meese J, 2015 p. 1820).
I created Merlin’s Moments to expose the atrocities that can be reduced; waste, animal cruelty, climate crisis etc. Social media allows citizen journalists to expose and highlight issues we have the power to change. Access to “social media, has created the possibility to quickly disseminate information and mobilise a huge number of activists… increasing the number of people in geometric progression; therefore, it draws attention of the powers.” (Skaidrė Ž, 2019, P. 4)
Vote with your dollar, become empowered and inspired by plant-based alternatives, watch my video below for a yummy smoothie recipe :))
Sources:
Texts:
Barrett, E 2020, ‘Plant-Based Meats Are Eating More Menu Space And It’s Not Just Because of Veganuary’, Fortune.com, p. N.PAG, viewed 6 September 2020, <https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.uow.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=heh&AN=141136002>.
Bakhshi, S., Shamma, D. A., & Gilbert, E. (2014). Faces engage us: Photos with faces attract more likes and comments on Instagram. CHI ‘14 Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 965–974). doi:10.1145/2556288.2557403
Connolly M. (2019), ‘Shoppers outraged over 'misleading' vegan 'meat' product labelling’, 7 News, New Idea Food, available at < https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/food/shoppers-outraged-over-misleading-vegan-meat-product-labelling-c-171612>
Lindell, AK 2019, ‘Left cheek poses garner more likes: the effect of pose orientation on Instagram engagement’, Laterality, vol. 24, no. 5, pp. 600–613, viewed 6 September 2020, https://search-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.uow.edu.au/login.aspx?direct=true&db=mnh&AN=30526363
Meese J et al., (2015) – Selfies at Funerals: Mourning and Presencing on Social Media Platforms (International Journal of Communication, vol. 9, pp. 1818-1831)
Pennington, R. (2018) ‘Social media as third spaces? Exploring Muslim identity and connection in Tumblr’, International Communication Gazette. 80: 7, pp 620-636.
Skaidrė Ž. (2019) Grassroots Activism and Sustainable Development. In: Leal Filho W. (eds) Encyclopedia of Sustainability in Higher Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63951-2_281-1
Images:
Coe S, 2012, from ‘You Consume Their Terror’ Excerpted from Cruel: Bearing Witness to Animal Exploitation, p. 9, Graphite, charcoal, synthetic polymer paint, on paper, New York; London, OR Books, accessed March 31 2020 <https://www.orbooks.com/catalog/cruel/>
Casey, M ‘Merlin’s Moments’, Instagram, available at https://www.instagram.com/merlins_moments/
Shoppers have been complaining that the packaging is misleading. Credit: AP/John Locher, (7 News, 2019) available at <https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/food/shoppers-outraged-over-misleading-vegan-meat-product-labelling-c-171612>
Videos:
Casey, M, 2018 ‘Vegan Smoothie Recipe’, YoutTube, available at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ap7C1FY4Hbs>