Devon Ferreira204519344 Final Assignment: Long Essay

In a society, like ours, which has fallen prey to segregation on the basis of race, gender, class,culture, age, ethnicity, etc, it is evident that individuals in a society, such as this, are perceived by many as being fundamentally different. There have been two notions relating to identityformation. The first is where society has tended to fix people into categories according totheir race, gender, class, age, etc, thereby implying or arguing for a biological determination(essentialism) of cultural and individual characteristics. Up until now it has been generallyaccepted that we enter the world with certain characteristic traits fixed from birth. To put itsimply, we are destined to become who we are from birth, in other words we are biologically programmed into the individuals we become. However social sciences now operate on a verydifferent perspective, which is the social construction of identity – through family, religion,educational institutions, mass media, peer pressure, etc. Social scientists further argue that weare not mere passive recipients in a society, but we are in fact active agents, participating insuch processes of identity construction. We are not fixed with the identities we are given at birth for all time; rather we are actively engaging in the reconstruction of those identitiesthereby creating a society with a multiplicity of identities. Since society has generallyadopted the view that people are fixed into their identities from birth, it has preventedindividuals from being able to understand others standpoints/experiences. There has beenmuch misunderstanding in the social world, concerning this issue because it is claimed thatwe cannot understand the thoughts, behaviours, desires, etc, of people who are said to befundamentally different from us. For social research there are significant implications whichneed to be considered with regards to the above mentioned issue, namely social and politicalsolidarity, communication, involvement on a sympathetic and empathetic level and dealingwith conflicts, all of which will be in jeopardy if the notion of fix identities continues to befollowed. There are two contradictory issues which arise from the issue of understandingothers experiences. There are those that strongly hold onto the fix notion of identities arguingwe can never come to understand the ‘other’ and that only people, who share gender, race,class, culture, age ethnicity, etc, can understand the experiences of those that are located insimilar positions. On the other hand there are others, who adopt a more social constructionistview and believe in order to understand the experiences of others, you need not have to

belong to the same gender, race, class, age, ethnic groups and share the same experiences.Instead we must be able to grasp the sense of the experiences of others, by reflecting on our own identities in relation to others, as well as identifying, describing and explaining thoseexperiences. Therefore this essay sets out to highlight the different notions of identityformation (fixed and fluid) suggesting that social identities are more fluid and subject tochange. I will then show that those people, who adopt the former notion of identity, believethat only people who are located in similar positions, such as gender, age, race etc canunderstand the experiences of others. Finally I will conclude by arguing if one had to adopt amore socially constructionist view on the matter they will see they will be able to grasp asense of others experiences by reflecting on their own identities in relation to others, as wellas identifying, describing and explaining those experiences.Social identity can be conceptualized as being connected to the individual’s knowledge thathe belongs to certain social groups, together with some emotional and value significance thatresults from this group membership (Campbell, 1993). A social group can be understood astwo or more individuals who share a common social identification, in other words theseindividuals perceive themselves to be members of a particular social category (Campbell,1993). Thus, it is through an individual’s sense of belonging to different groups in society thatthey acquire a social identity which defines their own specific identity within society.According to Jenkins (1996: 5), social identity is “understanding of who we are and of whoothers are, and reciprocally, other people’s understanding of themselves and others (whichincludes us).” Social identity in Jenkins’ view is therefore a result of complex negotiationswith ourselves and others. It is for that reason that social identity is about categorization,identification and comparison. In terms of categorization, we as a society of individuals often put others and ourselves for that matter, into categories. This involves labelling others asMuslims, single parents, or disabled people for example. This is a process wherebyindividuals are able to speak about and relate with other individuals. In terms of identification, individuals tend to associate themselves with other groups, their “in-groups”,which serve to bolster their self-esteem as it creates a sense of belonging. In terms of comparison, individuals tend to make judgements on “other” groups whilst comparing their “in-groups” with “others”, and more often than not they see a favourable bias towards thegroup to which they belong to. Out of this discrimination and exclusion arise whereby people

prevent others from having access to the same opportunities on the basis of difference for example race, age and gender.Jenkins (1996) mentions that social identity refers to ways in which individuals andcollectivities are eminent in their social relations with other individuals and collectivities.This involves a systematic process whereby relationships, between individuals, betweencollectivities, and between individuals and collectivities, of similarity and difference areestablished (Jenkins, 1996). Therefore, together, similarity and difference represent twodynamic principles of identity and are at the heart of social life. This is because they serve asa practical significance for individuals when attempting to identify with others. Similarity isno less important than difference and therefore both play an integral part in all internal andexternal developments (Jenkins, 1996).Traditional social psychologists frequently attempt to distinguish between two separate sub-systems of identity: The individual’s personality referring to those aspects of one’s identitythat are unique; and their social identity referring to those aspects of identity derived fromone’s belonging to a particular social grouping (Campbell, 1993). Each individual has arepertoire of identities open to them (social and personal); each identity informs theindividual of who they are and what this identity entails. Which of these identities is more prominent for an individual at any time will vary according to the particular social context.Critical social psychologists argue, however, that all identities are social in nature. They believe that it is impossible to speak of a purely personal identity (Campbell, 1993). SimilarlyJenkins (1996: 20) puts forward a viable argument in which he states that “if identity is anecessary prerequisite for social life, the reverse is also true”. This suggests that personalidentity, which is embodied in an individual’s self-hood, is meaningless when in isolation tothe rest of society. In other words, yes individuals are unique and variable; however their self-hood inevitably takes place within a socially defined set of limitations and possibilities,through the processes of socialization and social interaction in which individuals constantlydefine and redefine themselves and others in the course of their lives (Jenkins, 1996).