personneun

Personneun is a neologism used in sociolinguistic and digital-media discourse to describe the practice of constructing and presenting a person as a defined, data-driven persona within online communication. The term is typically applied in analyses of how individuals are framed by platforms, audiences, and interlocutors, often through profiles, posts, and micro-narratives that package identity into recognizable, repeatable units.

Etymology and coinage: The coinage appears to blend “person” with the Korean topic-marking suffix -은 (eun), signaling the attention given to the person as a topic of discussion in bilingual or cross-cultural settings. It emerged in scholarly or internet-native circles in the early 2020s as researchers began examining cross-cultural discourse about identity construction in social media.

Usage: In discourse analyses, personneun is used to refer to the stable presentation of a person as a “character” within a text, sometimes abstracted from the person’s offline self. It helps explain how audiences interpret credibility, authority, and personality from online artifacts.

Criticism and significance: Proponents argue that the concept clarifies how digital ecosystems shape subjectivity, while critics warn that it risks overgeneralizing complex identities or reducing people to personas.

See also: neologism, discourse analysis, persona theory, digital identity.