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The paper addresses the representation of female subjectivity on social media, highlighting how such women's images have a significant impact on the gendered narratives and discourses that populate the public sphere. The article analyzes specifically the pattern of femininity represented by female influencers and the bond they are able to establish with their followers. Starting from the notion of post-feminism sensitivity, it highlights how these celebrities embody its ideals in terms of self-realization, independence and empowerment. Finally, the figures of two of the most popular social media influencers in Italy, Chiara Ferragni and Benedetta Rossi, are analyzed, highlighting their ability to represent a successful model of female digital entrepreneurship. The analysis aims to point out how these media personae provide an ambivalent model of female subjectivity, because on one hand they emphasize women's ability to assert themselves as ambitious, professionally autonomous and free-choosing subjects (as postfeminist culture prescribes), but on the other hand they exploit the spur to female self-fulfillment for marketing aims, turning it into a self-branding tool.

In the collaborative context of the web 2.0 the blogging phenomenon has become one of the most common ways to communicate and share information through its user-generated content. In the blogosphere fashion blogs represent probably one of the liveliest segments. Focusing on fashion brands, fashion products, street style, and personal style, fashion blogs can be written by both fashion professionals and normal people with an interest in the fashion system. This phenomenon has become even more relevant since the fashion brands have recognized the role of fashion bloggers in influencing the final consumers as well as the role of peer – to – peer recommendations in shaping desires and attires of fashion blog users. The paper presents the preliminary results of a netnographic analysis conducted on some of the most popular Italian ‘non-professional’ fashion blogs in order to map the different approach to this grassrooted blog phenomenon, and to categorize and interpret the blog postings and the audience comments concerning fashion product-related information., Italian Sociological Review, Vol 7, No 1 (2017)