Selforism

The term selforism is proposed here for a recurrent form of social-media self-presentation in which a photograph of oneself is accompanied by an aphoristic, inspirational, or introspective sentence. The sentence need not refer to anything visible in the photograph. Its function is instead to place the image within a generalized account of the poster's character, emotional state, or personal development.

1. Form

1.1. A typical selforism consists of an ordinary portrait or self-portrait and a sentence of the form the chapter I feared most became my favourite, some storms clear the way, or another statement concerning growth, resilience, change, healing, departure, or self-knowledge. The statement is usually broad enough that the event to which it refers cannot be identified from the post alone.

1.2. The term does not require the sentence to be an actual quotation. Original sentences, unattributed quotations, song lines, and borrowed sayings perform the same function where they convert the photograph from a record of appearance into an assertion about the life represented by it. Vagueposting may overlap with the form, but obscurity is not required.

2. Function

2.1. The selforism joins two kinds of self-presentation which can otherwise be kept separate. The photograph presents the body, face, setting, or style; the caption presents an interior narrative. Neither needs to explain the other. Their conjunction permits a public image to be read as evidence of a private trajectory which the reader is not given enough information to reconstruct.

2.2. The resulting narrative is commonly retrospective. An unnamed difficulty has been crossed, a lesson has been learned, or an earlier self has been left behind. What is displayed is therefore not simply an emotion but a completed or continuing transformation. The aphoristic form removes most particulars and leaves a statement capable of describing both the poster and an indefinite number of readers.

3. Gendered use

3.1. The form appears, by ordinary observation, to be more common in posts by women than in posts by men. This difference is part of the reason for proposing a separate term, but it is not included in the definition. A selforism may be posted by anyone, and no count establishing the size or consistency of the gender difference is supplied here.

3.2. One possible account is that serious public narration of emotional growth is more readily available as a feminine mode of self-presentation. Comparable male posts more often appear to avoid an explicit account of interiority, or to place it behind humour, understatement, factual description, or irony. This is recorded as an interpretation of the contrast, not as its demonstrated cause.

4. Scope

4.1. Not every quotation below a portrait is a selforism. A lyric identifying the music being performed, a joke about the photograph, a literal description of the occasion, or a quotation included for an independently stated reason falls outside the term. The relevant feature is the use of a generalized maxim to supply a personal narrative to an otherwise insufficiently explanatory image.