“It’s embarrassing”: Youth conventions of self-presentation in urban and digital spaces

Based on an ethnographic study of urban youth cultures in Switzerland, this article analyzes the ways in which digital mediatization transforms the conventions of self-presentation among peers and, by extension, the ways young people appropriate urban spaces. Starting from the premise that physical and digital spaces are interconnected but not identical, it shows how the deep mediatization of the social world complexifies the social codes of self-presentation, as young people must navigate the possibility of having two audiences—one in person and one online.