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85 5 “Their Lives Are So Much Better Than Ours!” The Ritual (Re)construction of Social Identity in Holiday Cards JENNA MAHAY Concordia University Chicago Introduction TWO YEARS AGO I received one of those professionally printed holiday photo cards from some close friends who had recently moved to France. It was a particularly nice one. It was printed on heavy cardstock and opened up like a card you might buy at the store—except that it had their own pictures on it. On the front were two photos of their family of four, accompanied by the words “Joyeux Noel” and an elegant design. It opened up to four more photos on the left-hand side of their two children having fun in various leisure time activities, with a preprinted narrative of the highlights of the past year on the right-hand side. My four-year old daughter looked at it, and upon seeing the photos of her friends, asked me to read it to her. I had a feeling that somehow this was not going to go well. I read to her about their wonderful new life in France, the castles they had visited, how the kids loved their private school, and how quickly they were picking up French. Their dog, Jack, was having a fine time chasing birds in the vineyard behind their house. Sure enough, as soon as I finished reading , my daughter burst into tears. “Their lives are so much better than ours!” And then came, “I want to move somewhere. I feel like I’ve been here for a hundred years!” While contemplating whether I should remind her that she had not yet been on this earth even five years, I was struck by the clarity with which she recognized, and the directness with which she articulated, the aspects of both status and elite mobility being conveyed in this card. Out of the mouths of babes . . . The seeds of this analysis were actually planted quite a few years ago, when I first started receiving holiday cards that had been created using the (then-new) digital technology in which the individual uploads his or her own photos to a website and designs one’s own holiday card with them, selecting various designs and greetings provided by the website. The card is then professionally printed by an internet-based company and shipped back to the individual, who then sends them to everyone on his or her list. I remember being somewhat surprised to see pictures of our friends on top of Mount Kilimanjaro, on the beach, and in Sicily on their honeymoon printed on the holiday cards they sent us. While dutifully hanging them on the wall, I won- dered to myself, “What does this have to do with Christmas?” As I watched the holiday photo card technology develop, it seemed that these cards became less about wishing someone happy holidays, and more about something else. To be sure, holiday cards have always communicated something about the sender’s social identity and status. But the introduction of the technology to create one’s own customized professional -quality holiday photo cards online has turned them into something more. This study analyzes holiday photo cards on two of the leading high-end photo card retail websites from a sociological perspective. The study systemically examines the images, text, and design of these cards, as well as how they are described on the retail websites. I first briefly review the relevant literature on the performance and construction of social identity, and then describe the data and methods, findings, and conclusions of this study. My analysis shows that the availability of the digital technology that allows one to create one’s own customized holiday photo cards has turned the holiday card tradition into a powerful medium for constructing and displaying one’s own social identity in terms of class and status, but also in terms of membership within the hegemonic family ideal. Further, this analysis finds that a powerful part of what is ultimately communicated and reinforced through these holiday photo cards is a normative ideal of happiness itself. And finally, the ability to create one’s own professional quality holiday photo cards adds legitimacy and authority to one’s constructed social identity and the ideals portrayed. The (Re)construction of Social Identity Holiday photo cards can be seen as an important aspect of one’s “performance” of social identity from an interactionist perspective (Goffman 1959). Previous research has examined other forms...

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