Exploring the formation and curation of the self on TikTok through TikTok voice

Abstract

Content creators may seem to speak authentically on TikTok projecting relatable, friendly, and entertaining selves; however, their ways of communication are likely to have been carefully crafted. By describing how some TikTok content creators build their online selves through their communication styles, this dissertation reflects upon how identity is constructed in such a volatile and algorithm-driven platform. Thus, the main hypothesis concerns the formation and curation of TikTok content creators‘ public personae using the so-called TikTok voice: A particular form of communicating characterised by the use of certain sociophonetic phenomena—creaky voice and uptalk—paired with the technical, social, and creative affordances of TikTok. Upon studying a sub-group of users, this dissertation stems from a qualitative research project with a case study design which has analysed nine representative videos from three different TikTok accounts following Erving Goffman‘s (1959) theory of the self. The results show that the observed content creators creak frequently in phrase-final positions, use uptalk recurrently as a floor-holding strategy, and curate their online selves through their front stages, expressions given, and non-verbal cues, among other tactics. These finding become relevant to revisit how identity is performed on TikTok and to rethink how language varieties emerge or mutate.