Some very interesting points about the construction of self. Can I just complicate it even more by positing that the technology and/organisation policy also plays a role in constructing self. Consider those organisations that have equipment that only allows users an 8 character email address (those that still use some form of DOS based filenaming - and there are still many of those around). Now suppose your name is gregory burnstein then your email address may be something like g.burnst@, greg.bur@. gregory@ . Or even suppose you hail from a culture where your gender is indicated by the suffix on your surname, for example some parts Scandinavia where there is Christiansdottir, Christiansson and the name is truncated to Christian say. you are then rendered genderless(?) Another way that technology influences the construction of self is when you sign up with an internet based emailer (Hotmail, Yahoo etc) and you find that the ID you planned to have has already been taken and the registration program suggests a number of alternatives. For example suppose I wanted to register as dizzy@free_email.com but that name had already been taken it might suggest dizzy01, diz etc. Fairly simple examples I know but then what or who does an address such as dizzy@excite.com point to a person or a space where mail is stored? Maybe it is even redirected elsewhere. Andrew Wenn. (Who has at last stopped lurking!) -- -------------------------------------------------------------------- Andrew Wenn Victoria University of Technology, Footscray Campus PO Box 14428 MMC, Melbourne, Victoria 8001 Australia email Andrew.Wenn@vu.edu.au www http://busfa.vu.edu.au/awenn/ phone +61 3 9688 4342 fax +61 3 9688 5024 --------------------------------------------------------------------