Everything everywhere all at once: perceptions on the usage of flânerie on social media

Arthur Lopes Azevedo, Letícia Dias Fantinel
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21529/RECADM.2026007

Abstract

The main objective of this article was to discuss initial perceptions about the use of flânerie on social media, offering recommendations and warnings. To this end, we articulate a discussion based on field diaries from an ethnographic study we were developing on the dynamics of taste formation on social media, based on the Bourdieusian concept of "tastemaker," in which we adopted flânerie as an observational data production technique. As recommendations, we emphasize attention to the onto-epistemological alignments of the research, as well as to the issues of researcher reflexivity and the use of field diaries, given the mobility and flexibility the technique offers researchers within a complex tangle of networks that constitute the so-called messy web. As warnings, we primarily highlight the unhealthy asymmetries that operate on the "dark side" of social media and to which researchers will be exposed. By promoting such reflections, we believe we are contributing to the popularization of the technique, which is still little explored both internationally and nationally, as well as to discussions about such “dark side”.


Keywords

flânerie; qualitative methodology; observation; ethnography; social media

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