Date Thesis Awarded
4-2022
Access Type
Honors Thesis -- Access Restricted On-Campus Only
Degree Name
Bachelors of Arts (BA)
Department
American Studies
Advisor
Francesca Sawaya
Committee Members
Charles McGovern
Jerry Watkins, III
Abstract
The isolation following the COVID-19 pandemic had a massive influence on where young Americans chose to seek out community and comfort, namely social media platforms such as TikTok. TikTok’s ability to cater to the niche interests of its users made it a digital space that was used throughout the pandemic for teenagers and young adults questioning their gender identity to find each other and attempt to document and discuss their own lived experiences. A shift in how American society conceptualizes gender is both seen in and influenced by the youth discussion of nonbinary identity and its spread in the form of changing pronouns and new modes of gender presentation. I use the lens of informal theorizing to examine how young nonbinary and gender non-conforming Americans are parsing themselves on TikTok, piecing together their identities through humor, abstraction, and communal discussion.
Recommended Citation
Huffer, Miranda, "Revolutionizing Gender in One Minute or Less: Informally Theorizing Nonbinary Identity on TikTok" (2022). Undergraduate Honors Theses. William & Mary. Paper 1812.
https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses/1812
