1GyAp2x

130 C. J. PascoeThese tokens are part of the interactional relationship work that happensthrough new media; another is the expectation of availability. Teens findthat their significant others expect frequent check-ins, usually by mobilephone. Derrick said,When you’re in a relationship one thing I learned [is] always pick up the phone foryour girl because she complains if you don’t. . . . The thing about a cell phone whenyou’re a teenager is if you have a cell phone and you don’t pick it up you’re doingsomething that you’re not supposed to be doing. (Sims, Rural and Urban Youth)As Christo Sims notes in his research on urban and rural teens, teenagersare expected to account for their whereabouts. They are beholden toparents in this sense but also to significant others, especially in relationshipsin which trust might be missing or weak. As a result it might be hardto preserve space or time for oneself outside this frequent contact. In fact,Zelda said he knows he needs to answer the phone regularly because if hedoesn’t, “they probably going to get mad” (Sims, Rural and Urban Youth).The phone especially acts as a sort of leash, a way to keep tabs on a significantother, much like parents keep track of their teens. Teens seeminglyendure this leash because of the increased independence afforded them bythe phone.In addition to the expectations of regular, if not continual, contact, teensaffirm and are expected to affirm their relationships online, both by andfor their significant others and for their networked publics. Zelda underscoredthe importance of representing relationships online: “You gottaacknowledge on your page that you [are] like with her” (Sims, Rural andUrban Youth). They define and affirm their relationship status, give publictokens of affection, and post pictures. On Facebook, default relationshipoptions are preset, so in addition to indicating an “official” status, teenshave creatively developed ways to include nuance and detail in their relationshipdescriptions. The existing categories hide a variety of relationshipsand elide the depth or length of a given relationship, so teens sometimesremedy this by indicating the seriousness of a particular relationshipthrough noting its duration, a particularly popular practice among youthinterviewed by Christo Sims in Brooklyn, New York. According to Dana,mentioned earlier, couples write a relationship-origin date in their MySpaceheadline “to show that they have a relationship or something, so like that’sshowing more, and it shows that he’s in a relationship” (Sims, Rural andUrban Youth). The statement of a relationship anniversary is both a signalof intimacy to one’s significant other and a hands-off signal to other teens