2025/07/23 by Faye Mercier, Crystal Abidin · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · Computer Science · Neuroscience · #Digital Communication and Language #Face Recognition and Perception #Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies
paper · pdf · doi:10.1093/joc/jqaf038
openalex publication_date 2025/07/23 · openalex created_date 2025/12/04 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/03
Authenticity has long been a central concept in academic discussions of media, particularly in the context of digitization and the Internet. Early scholars working in this area have demonstrated how the internet’s participatory affordances, alongside the rise of surveillance-style reality television programming, led to an increase in discourses that praised authenticity for its “unfiltered” representation of the self and its supposed democratization of media entertainment (Andrejevic, 2002). Despite the initially celebratory tone that surrounded these early participatory media forms, scholars have criticized their democratic promises for ultimately reinforcing established power dynamics (Turner, 2010). Others have demonstrated how the purported authenticity of the “ordinary people” participating in these participatory media forms is often a theatrical performance that aims to appear genuine through the use of media skills and technologies (Senft, 2008). These core themes of authenticity as performance, the interplay between democratization and commodification, and the power dynamics embedded in participatory media have continued to shape critical discussions in the digital age. Scholars have increasingly interrogated how authenticity is constructed, negotiated, and commodified across diverse media landscapes, from social media platforms (e.g., Maddox, 2023; Marwick & boyd, 2011; Papacharissi, 2010; Van Dijck, 2009) to influencer cultures (e.g., Abidin, 2017; Arriagada & Bishop, 2021; Duffy & Hund, 2019). The books discussed in this critical review essay affirm the continued relevance of authenticity as academic concept and as sociocultural discourse. Together, they encompass three areas related to authenticity and social media: Authenticity and social media identity performance (Taylor, 2022; Gill, 2023; Piazzesi, 2023), authenticity in the cultural and influencer industries (Hund, 2023; Serazio, 2023), and authenticity and social media cities (Banks 2023; Hurley 2023). Allan S. Taylor’s Authenticity as Performativity on Social Media (2022) explores how authenticity is enacted as a performative process on social media, discussing its mimetic, affective, and ephemeral nature. Rosalind Gill’s Perfect: Feeling Judged on Social Media (2023) discusses the pressures and vulnerabilities that are experienced by women social media users as a result of pervasive norms of perfection, constant surveillance, and the demands of an authentic self-performance. Chiara Piazzesi’s book, The Beauty Paradox: Femininity in the Age of Selfies (2023), explores the complex and paradoxical relationships between beauty, femininity, and self-representation in the context of selfie culture, examining how women navigate the contradictory demands made of them in the name of “authentic” beauty. Together, these works illustrate the multifaceted nature of authenticity and self-representation on social media, demonstrating how individuals, especially women, engage with and negotiate the pressure of self-performance, beauty standards, and cultural expectations as mediated by social platforms. Emily Hund’s The Influencer Industry: The Quest for Authenticity on Social Media (2023) examines the centrality of authenticity to the influencer economy and its supporting industries, exploring how social media platforms and industry structure commodify personal identity and foster an economy of curated self-performance. Michael Serazio’s book, The Authenticity Industries: Keeping It “Real” in Media, Culture, and Politics (2023), equally discusses the commodification of authenticity, analyzing how it is strategically manufactured across a range of industries and arenas, from pop music to reality TV to contemporary politics. Moving from industry to urban development, David A. Banks in The City Authentic: How the Attention Economy Builds Urban America (2023) reveals how authenticity is equally coveted and commodified in urban contexts, highlighting tensions between local identity, place branding, and the economic forces shaping contemporary city scapes. Similarly, Zoe Hurley’s Social Media Influencing in the City of Likes: Dubai and the Postdigital Condition (2023) examines the interplay between social media influencer, urban branding, and digital culture, focusing on the aspirational images constructed by and about Dubai. These books illustrate how discourses on authenticity have moved beyond legacy and social media to inform industries, urban development, and politics. This essay contends that recent academic work on authenticity reveals a distinctive discursive gaze: a socio-technical mechanism that trains individuals and institutions to evaluate the self and others according to shifting, yet structured, norms of authenticity. Unlike earlier forms of social evaluation, this gaze is institutionalized through platform infrastructures, data metrics, and aesthetic conventions that systematically shape self-presentation for visibility and judgment. The term discursive emphasizes how this gaze functions through structured systems of communication and representation embedded within these digital and algorithmic frameworks. This gaze is directed both inward, prompting individuals to assess their own performances, and outward, urging them to read and evaluate the people, places, and things they encounter as objects for the construction and validation of authenticity. Authenticity is therefore a situated and relational construct—a performance of the self that is legible as coherent with both prior self-performances and social scripts, and that is validated by others. Authenticity is experienced as affectively “true” within these interactions, yet it remains an ephemeral and dynamic negotiation of identity. Beginning with an analysis of how these books each frame authenticity, this essay will demonstrate how together these discussions reveal authenticity’s discursive gaze and its relational, situated, and shifting contours. It will then discuss how this gaze operates and structures specific contexts, from the cultural industries to urban planning and promotion to individual practice and self-representation. This essay will therefore demonstrate how authenticity is shaped by historical, economic, and technological contexts. It will also show that authenticity functions as a dynamic gaze, shifting across cultural industries, urban spaces, and social media to reveal how subjects and institutions engage in cycles of validation and critique. The books reviewed for this essay each discuss authenticity to different degrees. While authenticity is central to the arguments of Hund (2023), Banks (2023), Serazio (2023), and Taylor (2022), it is a secondary concern for Gill (2023), Piazzesi (2023), and Hurley (2023), for whom authenticity is just one of many constructs shaping their respective case studies. However, for all books authenticity is something necessary, yet often difficult, to define. For example, Emily Hund (2023) discusses the many different connotations that authenticity carries within influencer industries, noting its associations with unfiltered “realness,” relatability, truth, and naturalness. However, Hund also notes that authenticity is increasingly constructed, quantified, and commodified for commercial gain. Similarly, Serazio (2023, p. 66) discusses the ideas of “rough cut” authenticity that have governed celebrity and status in music and reality television, demonstrating how an “aesthetic bias” for raw and informal self-presentation is largely catered to through an emphasis on local roots and emotional self-disclosure. Both Hund (2023) and Serazio (2023) demonstrate that authenticity is a shifting goal post around which the cultural and influencer industries pivot; if “realness” relies on presenting something in its original, unmediated form, then the act of mediation inherently compromizes its authenticity. For this reason, the influencer and cultural industries are always looking for new authentic persons and places to capitalize on. Hurley (2023), Serazio (2023), and Banks (2023) each demonstrate that authenticity is highly contextual, with its meaning contingent on the setting in which it is mobilized and the power dynamics between individuals, institutions, and the cultural frameworks through which it is performed. This constantly shifting nature explains why Piazzesi (2023) argues that inauthenticity is easier to define than authenticity; her respondents noted that, while authenticity remains an elusive and paradoxical concept, failures to achieve it are readily identifiable and easy to critique. Taylor (2022) would argue that this difficulty in capturing authenticity lies with its relational and ephemeral nature, suggesting that authenticity is “a trace of something known tacitly but unavailable to access in a permanent way” (p. 13). He asserts that authenticity is performativity, an affective and resonant thing that emerges in the moment when people use familiar words, images, or gestures to make something feel real. For this reason, authenticity is also relational, as it is dependent on both performer and audience being able to recognize and understand this performance as familiar. Taylor’s aim with this definition is to intervene in how authenticity on social media is discussed by authors like Hund (2023), Piazzesi (2023), and Serazio (2023), suggesting that their emphasis on authenticity’s multiple meanings and interpretations only perpetuate the idea that it ‘cannot be defined’ (Taylor, 2022, p. 5). Rather than accept that authenticity is paradoxical, as Piazzesi (2023) might claim, Taylor (2022, p. 25) argues that true authenticity is performative, while the rise of what he calls “the neoliberal authentic” reflects the of authenticity to neoliberal the that individuals constantly their and through and forms of For Taylor (2022, p. this neoliberal of the authentic has led to the rise of on social media, the of norms and that “realness” to the as personal and While Taylor’s are in the affective and relational of authenticity, aim to define authenticity its neoliberal only the idea that authenticity has Authenticity emerges as something performative and Taylor’s of performative authenticity is to Serazio’s (2023) that authenticity has an aesthetic for the raw and Both that authenticity is shaped and by and performative than being an Rather than to define what authenticity it to and the different discourses on authenticity that within contemporary social media Hund (2023), Serazio (2023), and Taylor (2022) reveal that authenticity, as an is on the of the self for commercial which with to an and identity. This is by Hurley’s (2023, p. that authenticity within influencer cultures is on the of the than something Hund (2023) this as a of according to This social media and as Gill (2023, it has led to the of a or gaze women social media users that is to the self and others. This gaze is central to the of authenticity on social media, which to a between the and the in their self-presentation p. This relational of authenticity is by Banks (2023), argues that authenticity validation from with a individuals of their authenticity, as or associations with places, to and Authenticity on social media as a commercial or and social as to Despite the of this authenticity, these books also reveal a that authenticity on personal to self-representation that with and Both Gill (2023) and Piazzesi (2023), in their on use of social media, demonstrate how women critical and in to the authenticity of Gill (2023, p. how her respondents with the demands to be and yet also to be of her respondents discussed their social media to their and while others criticized the demands that social media only be to Similarly, Piazzesi (2023, p. notes that while her respondents to from cultures of they to true self from These tensions are also in the influencer with Hund (2023) noting that for industry authenticity with These a continued of social media as a democratic individuals to from commercial pressures and these reveal is that contemporary discourses on authenticity have the construction of a new discursive gaze, which individuals to and and of the Authenticity is a situated and relational construct—a performance of the self that is legible as coherent with both prior self-performances and social scripts, and that is validated by others. It is experienced as affectively “true” within these interactions, yet remains an ephemeral and dynamic negotiation of identity, shaped by the pressures of neoliberal the and of social media and the cultural that Authenticity demands constant process of and across platforms and on Gill’s (2023, p. idea of the which trains users to assess and others in that authenticity’s discursive gaze has these across individuals, institutions, and will demonstrate in the this gaze a in shaping of setting standards, and both individual and within and contexts. This gaze is just is It authenticity but how it is and understand how individuals navigate this gaze, to authenticity as a of identity performance, examining how people and the they to and how these are shaped by cultural and the of the authenticity is always about the how to the of how others would how to these to appear and how industries capitalize on these and how social norms the of authenticity, and how these shape the this how authenticity is an identity performance, the work of Taylor define authenticity as being relational and of Piazzesi (2023) and Gill (2023), on neoliberal authenticity. Taylor (2022) that authenticity is a performance process that is or but an in to and (p. authenticity is a of or or a of but and (p. the of social media to users a of through a or and of digital (p. engage in authenticity as a and cultural industry will discuss in a the of authenticity with the of (p. for people, authenticity also be for (p. through the of (p. and as being and (p. This of (p. is the in and beauty cultures of For Piazzesi (2023) and Gill (2023), the of authentic of the of women they is with the pressures of of in the beauty industry are as a from the of being and being of being to through or p. This an authenticity that and (p. the of both authors reveals how authenticity as has been by cultural social and to women and in the of social Gill’s (2023) work to the centrality of in the of authenticity and the of are and of the images they engage with and (p. and the others and on social media are authentic or and the authenticity is about being than being or about looking a of and as in the (p. Piazzesi (2023) that these are mediated by a of mediated by cultural commercial and by in the access to and (p. to to these expectations women to within or on social media, or in the that are on the to women for and p. in the of authenticity in the beauty is and highly p. but (p. Piazzesi (2023) how of the self on social a an a of the authentic a of Authenticity has to be and and often through selfie (p. These of true self to be through (p. by a constant and of the self (p. words, beauty and selfie to on the that Taylor (2022, p. and authenticity work is a of a of and the as Gill (2023) Piazzesi also the many tensions of authentic as what and appear on the but are in reality of the of to which women are (p. The authenticity asserts that is to be but to achieve this women are to engage in and (p. women are and women to appear “authentic” to this (p. women appear are but are are and “authentic” (p. This is a that women is about beyond the of beauty and authenticity. Gill (2023) that for many of the women both and in spaces, authenticity is about in being and to navigate the of and in “the and in this to accept that in beyond the of and authenticity is identity and in and p. the by Gill (2023) and Piazzesi (2023) an through discussions of and to demonstrate how authenticity pressures are Taylor’s (2022) how and images of the self of identity, validation from and cycles of commodification and self-representation. These are in and as the and of authenticity make it all the and yet on social media, the for beauty and validation an for authenticity that and of these is in the of the influencer economy and cultural industries, which will book, Taylor (2022) with a to the authentic in social media as and inherently that the meaning is in the of the or to people what authenticity to individual users and then will to to the idea that it be or it is it the of the term as an yet aspirational that is always just of (Taylor, 2022, p. This (Taylor, 2022, p. of authenticity is the and of the influencer and cultural industries, and this the from Hund work on the influencer industry and Serazio’s (2023) work on the cultural industries to assess the of authenticity being her of the of authenticity in the influencer Hund (2023, p. the of an contingent industry and for and and of authenticity that are always (p. The is in the pressure for to the of to of authenticity and their and (p. This practice of and (p. is ultimately for and to a of authenticity to be strategically and the of the influencer economy and the industries, authenticity a for and of authenticity with that but often as authentic (Hund, p. as Serazio (2023) authenticity as authentic be a and early of known as to be people” and to the for in the media authenticity (Hund, p. while in the to people in p. the to to and foster words, authenticity on to with their (Hund, p. and just of the in to them of their p. while all of the authenticity and systematically and enacted in the cultural industries authenticity often as a a to individual identity the of (p. just as would as beyond to like that they (Hund, p. For of authenticity, the process a constant of the self and the self in to examining the of authenticity. Influencer often of to or presenting (Hund, p. as a to appear This to as as long as their a of (p. when influencer audience they often on or for the of a authentic self (p. the of social and media, industry would also to mediation as a of authenticity. and as authentic they to mediation p. This p. through the idea that the process and to feel they a Despite Taylor’s (2022, p. emphasis that the shape of authenticity it to be and by authenticity by as something a or (Hund, p. something central to specific and forms, like of music p. when the of highly manufactured pop authenticity is constructed by ultimately of and for communication and are (Hund, p. to the and beauty of the entertainment and industry (p. the and negotiation of authenticity for individuals often as is “the “the self one p. is (Hund, p. curated for an How are of these by and p. the of being by others or by the and the of or (Hund, p. a the of authenticity has it an an p. that the of a (p. which when through social media is by the and of and (Hund, p. This authenticity to be according to the the of and the of use to and the social norms and that (p. Authenticity is a it is commodified and new It functions as a gaze in cultural industries, while commodification and critique. This but and economic and the gaze of authenticity is the that cultural and the and social dynamics that the ephemeral and of authenticity. to the individual and cultural of authenticity, both Hurley (2023) and Banks (2023) reveal that urban are equally to authenticity’s discursive Hurley’s Social Media Influencing in the City of Likes: Dubai and the Postdigital Condition argues that Dubai like an influencer it that, in the all of to be and (p. Hurley how authenticity’s discursive gaze functions as a for and cities like Dubai in aspirational with influencer While explores how individuals Dubai her of the city the institutions, and shaping its social media The City Authentic: How the Attention Economy Builds Urban America (2023) how city and institutions strategically social media urban This will how Hurley and Banks authenticity’s discursive gaze work in their respective contexts. It will demonstrate that, these frameworks how authenticity is both a relational and a shaping only how cities but also how they are experienced and in the age. Banks (2023, p. a for how discourses of authenticity and social media are how cities are the of as a case he the City a of and ideas that for meaning and to economic The City is a specific to the development, and promotion of the city that and local to and through the of and on social (p. While Banks notes that authenticity is often an term when in these contexts, he argues that its is highly as a mechanism to and by an emotional to Banks (2023) asserts that authenticity is about the place but the affective it for others. Authenticity is therefore For the city local and to their city to or Banks that they increasingly to the gaze that these use to assess the This the city through and that make the authenticity and to this is the use of social media often on or to the city as a place that might with a social media own of authentic Banks how the City the of urban with social media the performance of authenticity a for economic and cultural Hurley’s (2023) analysis of Dubai as a of is a to (2023) demonstrating how discourses of authenticity cities to in different While Banks emphasizes the of and cultural in the Hurley explores how Dubai as a and Hurley notes that has been by her discuss the different shape its Hurley on and the in which they Dubai and this Hurley of authenticity as an of with the and urban in to their as Unlike the with its emphasis on and nature, Hurley (2023) that Dubai has to with the gaze of a specific social media one images of and that of authenticity. Dubai might be “authentic” in that it is it is shaped with authenticity’s discursive gaze in Hurley that Dubai is as a city for a place status and with the of Dubai a that only but also as a of and working in the city and social in the digital age. Both Hurley (2023) and Banks (2023) illustrate the of authenticity’s discursive gaze in shaping contemporary how its economic and This p. in which a place is as a tensions and power Banks how the economic from authenticity often and to and local These a context in which only to in the the that and (p. Banks also notes that authenticity the of cultures while also tensions about is to in and define a Hurley’s (2023) how and the in that Dubai as a and Hurley examines how Dubai and its in the the of noting how as for to Dubai Hurley also notes how Dubai and its influencer that a with of their (p. Despite promises of Hurley’s case reveal the systems of and cycles of that this in influencer with to for and women in the city and identity while many in is on a Hurley (2023) and Banks (2023) reveal how authenticity’s discursive gaze economic the of cultural and the of This has demonstrated how authenticity’s discursive gaze urban branding, and cities to that with its Both Banks (2023) and Hurley (2023) show how this gaze them of identity, or However, their also reveal the and economic of this commodification, from and to the of and the of The books reviewed in this essay illustrate how authenticity functions as a discursive gaze that structures identity, and across social media, cultural industries, and urban While often as elusive or paradoxical, authenticity is a but a of and identity. It is shaped by the of individuals, institutions, and industries and is central to of validation and critique. This review has how authenticity operates across different contexts, highlighting its in branding, and while also how it is and on this analysis authenticity as a dynamic socio-technical discursive gaze that is from platform and a for its contemporary across these works is the of authenticity with neoliberal and economic identity a of shaped by economic and social Taylor (2022) authenticity as performative and relational, a through However, as Piazzesi (2023) and Gill (2023) authenticity is constructed but shaped by social expectations and platform in navigate pressures to appear while to beauty and Gill’s concept of the gaze how users these standards, reinforcing the of while for from the influencer and cultural industries, authenticity is shaped by commercial Hund (2023) and Serazio (2023) show how authenticity functions as both a and a mechanism within media and authenticity while an of while cultural industries new forms of “realness” to Serazio notes that the for self-presentation reflects a between and Hund how influencer industries authenticity, it an and platforms define and its and industry authenticity’s discursive gaze also urban Banks (2023) and Hurley (2023) reveal how cities strategically social media to Banks how and local are in urban branding, while Hurley examines authenticity is as a of aspirational Both show how authenticity is just a personal concern but a that institutions use to shape and However, as Banks the commodification of urban authenticity often social reinforcing and cultural These that authenticity functions as a discursive gaze, shaping how individuals, industries, and cities and meaning in the digital age. While authenticity is for economic it also remains a individuals and negotiate meaning and Gill’s (2023) on self-representation authenticity a of than a to Similarly, Hund (2023) and Banks (2023) how and local of authenticity, for This review has how authenticity’s discursive gaze operates across self-performance, influencer and urban spaces, its as a dynamic and Rather than a these works demonstrate how authenticity how its are negotiated, and how its to shape digital and social