Abstract/Summary

The practice of ‘personal branding’ has increasingly become a prominent feature of many professions, even academia. Previous research on personal branding, especially in marketing and business studies, tends to view it in a positive light, as a route to career advancement, while others have questioned its individualistic focus, claiming that it fails to consider inequalities, societal contexts, and the collaborative nature of communication. At the same time, previous research on academics’ use of online platforms has often focused on specific platforms or genres, or the networks formed. This thesis frames personal branding as a linguistic phenomenon involving continuous identity work. It considers identity construction as a matter of performances taking place through participation in social groups. It uses the notion of ‘literacies’ to shed light on the relationship between language, identity and social practices, and also considers the influence of mediating digital technologies. Mediated discourse analysis provides the theoretical framework for in-depth nexus analysis informed case studies that combine semi-structured interviews and online data collected from websites and different social media platforms to examine the branding practices of three UK academics. Personal branding is seen not as a practice in itself, but as a set of literacies, that is, a set of social practices which are mediated by texts (and other mediational means such as social media sites and digital devices). These professional practices are historically situated and embedded in particular social and cultural practices. Therefore, contrary to what the popular discourse claims, learning personal branding is not about repeating a standard set of steps or exercises. Instead, what is really required is learning the professional practices of the particular community in which one wishes to participate and understanding the ways in which members of the community make their participation in these practices visible online.