Lesbianities and ideations in cyberspace

The narratives of young activists on instagram as part of the fight against lesbophobia

Abstract

In this article we propose ourselves to analyze how young lesbians build their identities in activisms against lesbophobia from the narratives they produce on the social media Instagram and how this kind of activism contributes to their fight. We discuss, at first, about historical and scientific approaches of lesbianity and about lesbophobia – political mechanism of oppression, social domination and subordination of lesbians – using the theorizations of Lorenzo (2012). The concept of “identity” is brought from Melucci (2004) as a field of action with a personal and self-reflective character, built from the definition of ourselves. The methodological approach aligns with the virtual ethnography (HINE, 2004), made in the social media Instagram in 2021. Public posts were selected by four young lesbians, with ages between 25 and 34 years old. The profiles were selected for turning visible subjects about lesbianities, and the analyses show that the autobiographical content prevails in the textual narratives and image from the activists, being a feature of online activism. There are multiple narrative strategies applied to invest and turn visible the topic of lesbian movements. We can state that the identities of these activists are built daily by writing about themselves, as well as by the development of a net of exchange of information and affection with other lesbians. There is a political use of Instagram as posts turn lesbianities and the lesbian existences into common themes, searching, also, identity and fight acknowledgment.