Buy It Now

Buy It Now, Michele White examines eBay and its emphasis on community and social norms, revealing the cultural assumptions about gender, race, and sexuality that are reinforced throughout the site. She shows how instructional texts, rule systems, and advertisements "configure the user," allowing eBa...

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Main Author: White, Michele
Format: Online
Language:English
Published: Duke University Press 2023
Subjects:
Online Access:https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/61576
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author White, Michele
author_browse White, Michele
author_facet White, Michele
author_sort White, Michele
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description Buy It Now, Michele White examines eBay and its emphasis on community and social norms, revealing the cultural assumptions about gender, race, and sexuality that are reinforced throughout the site. She shows how instructional texts, rule systems, and advertisements "configure the user," allowing eBay to indicate how the site is supposed to function while also upholding particular values and practices. White details how eBay reinforces stereotypes about gender and sexuality, looking, for example, at descriptions included in wedding dress listings, and how eBay directs individuals to the "Adult Only" part of the website when they use the search terms "gay" and "lesbian." She discloses the ways that eBay promises a caring community but its "Black Americana" category reproduces racism by allowing sellers' narratives that excuse and romanticize slavery and insult African Americans. White also looks at how participants challenge eBay's categories, rules, and values, examining widely used strategies of resistance by sellers and buyers in the lesbian and gay interest listings. By analyzing the organizational and cultural logics present in eBay, White emphasizes how other Internet settings, including craigslist, are not as transparent, community-oriented, and empowering as they claim. She proposes methods for researching and reconceptualizing new media sites.
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publishDate 2023
publishDateRange 2023
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publisher Duke University Press
publisherStr Duke University Press
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-977212025-07-30T19:28:06Z Buy It Now White, Michele Social Science Gender Studies Computers Human-computer Interaction (HCI) thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups thema EDItEUR::U Computing and Information Technology::UY Computer science::UYZ Human–computer interaction Buy It Now, Michele White examines eBay and its emphasis on community and social norms, revealing the cultural assumptions about gender, race, and sexuality that are reinforced throughout the site. She shows how instructional texts, rule systems, and advertisements "configure the user," allowing eBay to indicate how the site is supposed to function while also upholding particular values and practices. White details how eBay reinforces stereotypes about gender and sexuality, looking, for example, at descriptions included in wedding dress listings, and how eBay directs individuals to the "Adult Only" part of the website when they use the search terms "gay" and "lesbian." She discloses the ways that eBay promises a caring community but its "Black Americana" category reproduces racism by allowing sellers' narratives that excuse and romanticize slavery and insult African Americans. White also looks at how participants challenge eBay's categories, rules, and values, examining widely used strategies of resistance by sellers and buyers in the lesbian and gay interest listings. By analyzing the organizational and cultural logics present in eBay, White emphasizes how other Internet settings, including craigslist, are not as transparent, community-oriented, and empowering as they claim. She proposes methods for researching and reconceptualizing new media sites. 2023-03-03T04:41:08Z 2023-03-03T04:41:08Z 2023-02-28T05:31:30Z 2012 book https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/61576 9780822352402 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/97721 eng open access image/jpeg image/jpeg image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/61576/1/external_content.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/61576/1/external_content.pdf https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/20.500.12657/61576/1/external_content.pdf Duke University Press Duke University Press 8b9381d6-252e-4bed-8478-ee620c861aac Knowledge Unlatched 9780822352402 Knowledge Unlatched (KU) KU Select 2023: HSS Backlist Books Duke University Press open access
spellingShingle Social Science
Gender Studies
Computers
Human-computer Interaction (HCI)
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups
thema EDItEUR::U Computing and Information Technology::UY Computer science::UYZ Human–computer interaction
White, Michele
Buy It Now
title Buy It Now
title_full Buy It Now
title_fullStr Buy It Now
title_full_unstemmed Buy It Now
title_short Buy It Now
title_sort buy it now
topic Social Science
Gender Studies
Computers
Human-computer Interaction (HCI)
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups
thema EDItEUR::U Computing and Information Technology::UY Computer science::UYZ Human–computer interaction
topic_facet Social Science
Gender Studies
Computers
Human-computer Interaction (HCI)
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general::JBS Social groups, communities and identities::JBSF Gender studies, gender groups
thema EDItEUR::U Computing and Information Technology::UY Computer science::UYZ Human–computer interaction
url https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/61576
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