Identity for Sale: Authenticity, Commodification, and Agency in YouTube Influencers

Social media influencers’ popularity can be attributed to their ability to balance appealing to an audience with the need to sell a brand. However, this also raises questions about their agency. Relying on structuration theory, field theory, and the principle of profilicity, this research examines how YouTube influencers negotiate between the need to appear as authentic and their need to perform for financial gain and how these needs interact to impact user agency. Interviews, observations, and content analysis were used to explore the relationship between agency, commodification, and perceived authenticity in influencers’ performances. The findings show that perceived authenticity and agency are inexorably linked and constrained by the commodification inherent in influencers’ performances, pointing to a need to reconceptualize structures as emergent and embodied, and highlighting how influencers face a hierarchy of choices that both enable and constrain their agency.