Female Influencers’ Self-presentation and Digital Leadership in Morocco: A Multimodal Discourse Analysis Approach to their Posted Content on Instagram

Abstract

In recent years, social media have presented a significant virtual space for women to exercise their feminine subjectivity and realize the values of self-enhancement, ambition and leadership by managing the perceptions of others and projecting a desired social image. Many of the digital platforms host a plethora of social relations across various cultural, racial and gendered variables. With the ascent of social influencers on Facebook, tik-toc and Instagram, new modes of gender representations and leadership dynamics have come to the surface. Thus, female influencers on social media have managed to garner a larger pool of followers through impression management and positive self-presentation. This paper tries to investigate the textual and visual narratives of four Moroccan female influencers and analyze the content of their posts to unfold the strategies of impression management and self-presentation that control the way followers perceive them. The analysis of their content shows that these influencers use different modes (reels, multimodal texts, selfies…) and genres (micronarratives about everyday routines, didactic parables, quotes, poem recitations, endorsed advertisements), and interact with the media affordances at play on Instagram (like reduced anonymity, persistence and visibility), being heedful of the other generated content (likes, shares, comments) and context collapse (networked public). The analysis indicates the consistent use of strategies of impression management in five related factors, namely, self-concept, desired identity, role constraints, target value, and current or potential social image.  The study aims to unfold the strategies used by these micro-influencers to project a desired social image and explain how these influencers manage the way they want their audience to perceive them (as leaders) and follow them.