Combining theoretical and empirical discussions with shorter "thick
description" case studies, this book offers an anthropological
exploration of the emergence in Malaysia of lifestyle bloggers -
precursors to current social media "microcelebrities" and "influencers."
It tracks the transformation of personal blogs, which attracted readers
with spontaneous and authentic accounts of everyday life, into lifestyle
blogs that generate income through advertising and foreground
consumerist lifestyles. It argues that lifestyle blogs are dialogically
constituted between the blogger, the readers, and the blog itself, and
challenges the assumption of a unitary self by proposing that lifestyle
blogs can best be understood in terms of the "dividual self."