Haley means hero, Haylee means hayfield.

Haley Anderson’s blog is fairly typical overall; the title, date and layout template are all run of the mill. What caught my eye was her April 24, 2007 blog post, in which she writes about her observations in regards to what she is wearing, both from the perspective of an outsider and her own explanation of why she chose to appear the way she does.
The personality profile that Haley gives within part one of this post was especially interesting. Each separate part of the personality profile is given its own line; the person’s general identifying characteristics (listed as “UW student”), sex, age, race and religion all seem to have equal weight due to their occupation of their own lines. This spacing imposes order; within the great realm of text that greets a blog reader are a few self-contained and concise information bubbles that give direct descriptions of traits that help the reader visualize and identify their soon-to-be-(figuratively)-dissected subject.
By ordering the traits this way, Haley also gives a nod to socially constructed norms. For example, her listing of gender so early on as an identifier struck me as interesting. One of the things I first learned in Women’s Studies was about the social construction of gender. Because people have certain conceptions about what gender entails (a woman will have “feminine” traits such as her way of dressing, a man distinctly “masculine” traits, for example, the way he walks), it is one of our most important social identifiers. Haley seems to rank gender higher on her list of identifiers than race or age, which are also important identifying characteristics in our society, yet not as identifiable or as socially acceptable to use as gender is. Oddly enough, perhaps because she is observing herself, or perhaps because UW students are the primary form of society hereabouts, Haley has “UW Student” at the top of her list of identifying characteristics. The use of these characteristics suggests that they are important and recognizable ways of creating identities. The spacing she uses overall in this list seems to add order and indicate the importance of these characteristics as well.