Growing up in a world of platforms: What changes and what doesn't?

While the notion of the ‘digital native’ has been widely critiqued on empirical, theoretical and political grounds, the conceptual structure of these arguments has received much less scrutiny. Through a critical engagement with the technologised essentialism that permeates lay and expert commentary on the implications of socio-technical innovation for emerging adults, I develop a conceptual framework (platform and agency) that avoids this tendency, built around the analysis of reflexivity and relations in tracing out interaction between people and technology over time in structured contexts. I apply this framework to the question of socialisation, developing the concept of ‘potential selves’ to explore the platform society as a cultural context for socialisation. The generations growing up within a platformised world, the younger millennials and the ‘zoomers’ who are coming after them, cannot be adequately understood as either digital natives or digital narcissists. They do, however, confront some unique existential challenges, which the economic, social and political ramifications of the crisis unfolding around us makes it even more urgent that we understand.