The struggle to appropriately communicate who we are exists all around us: navigating our digital identities on social media, dating apps, and other online platforms; wondering how to interact appropriately in a competitive job market; grappling with how to broach controversial topics with professors, supervisors, and family members. All these scenarios reflect the precarious and fascinating negotiation of self-disclosure. Self-disclosure is a communicative way of knowing through the verbal and nonverbal patterns humans engage to reveal and understand dimensions about self and others. When self-disclosure is strategic and functional, it can have positive effects for interpersonal relationships and provide incredible insight into knowing the self and others. Conversely, self-disclosure can also lead to embarrassment, misunderstood identities, and relationship deterioration. By studying theories of social penetration and social comparison, evaluating the way privacy boundaries are established and maintained, and discerning the nature of reciprocity in relationships, current contexts where identities are developed will be studied in this seminar, and students will be asked to analyze the way various individuals and communities participate in self-disclosure behaviors and the implications therein.