The Role of Social Media in the Life of Women: A Study in Rasht

The Increase in the penetration rate of the Internet and the number of membership in social networks through mobile phones has been remarkable in recent years in Iran. The presence of women in social media and the impact of social media on their lives is important from the sociological point of view. This article, while reviewing the conceptual framework and some of the researches and theories related to women's bonding with communication technologies, has a special focus on Cyber-Feminism. The main question of the article is the impact of membership on social networks on the lives of employed and housewives. The authors conducted a deep interview with 15 housewives and employed women in the city of Rasht based on a qualitative method and a non-objective sampling with snowball technique. The findings of the study indicate that social networks increase the domain of social relationships and so facilitate their participation in various social, cultural, scientific and educational arena, which corresponds to the ideas of Cyber feminism. The authors believe that the issues such as the patriarchal system, lack of security in cyberspace, lack of adequate media literacy and media skills among women, challenge the empowerment and the active presence of women in cyberspace which is the claim of Cyber-feminism.