SWK3017-4. constructing the other

Identity, Selfhood and Social Construction Work

Tim Curtis

self as bounded container

Burkitt (1991: 1) put it, 'the view of human beings as self-contained unitary individuals who carry their uniqueness deep inside themselves, like pearls hidden in their shells' is deeply engrained.

Damasio (2000) has argued that Consciousness is 'an entirely private, first-person phenomenon'. 

'natural' ideas (Sampson (1993: 34): the boundary of the individual is coincident with the

boundary of the body; the body is a container that houses the individual; the individual is best understood as a self-contained

entity.

Problems with this

central point of reference in political or moral debates is the rights and experiences of the individual

all the important features that comprise the person - everything that the person owns - and that this is distinct, separate and cut-off from all that is not part of the person, located outside the container' (Sampson 1993: 36).

picture of the individual and society as separate realms. There is a division between individual and society, between individual and social worlds.

In capitalist society…

the separation between the individual and society becomes fully manifest.

impersonal state apparatus and a growing division of labour

in this web of relationships, exchanges are less personal and more dependent on the use of objects (and money)

supremity of individualism

the supreme value and dignity of the individual;

the individual as independent and autonomous - with thoughts and actions not determined by outside agencies; and

self-development - with the onus on individuals to develop their talents to the fullest. (Lukes 1973)

Self as social

Humans are always in social relationships from the moment they are born and they remain part of a network of other people throughout their lives (Burkitt 1991: 2).

Independent (Western thought) Dependent (Eastern (Japanese)

thought) Hindu man is asked for his identity, 'he will

give you his name, the name of his village, and his caste' (Bharati 1985: 211).

the dialogical self

our selves are formed in interaction with others. (George Herbert Mead- Chicago School of Urban Sociology)

mind as a form of conversation - it is a conversation held internally with a person's own self. The 'Me' is the identity that the self develops

through seeing its form in the attitudes others take towards it.

‘I’ is the agent, the active component of the self as it organizes the attitudes of others-the process of thinking.

‘Generalised Other’ is the organized set of attitudes, and their corresponding responses which are common to the group.

Symbolic interactionism

"Human beings act toward things on the basis of the meanings they ascribe to those things."

"The meaning of such things is derived from, or arises out of, the social interaction that one has with others and the society."

"These meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretive process used by the person in dealing with the things he/she encounters.“

http://web.grinnell.edu/courses/soc/s00/soc111-01/IntroTheories/Symbolic.html

Identity work Within every social encounter, individuals

subtly assert elements of their identity (Goffman, 1959).

Identity work refers to a “range of activities individuals engage in to create, present, & sustain personal identities”, as individuals and as parts of collectivities (Snow & Anderson, 1987; Einwohner, 2006).

Within this idea, it is important to remember that an identity is not a fixed thing and it is just as difficult maintaining one as it is constructing one in the first place.

Just men?

Individuals may engage in a variety of forms of identity work through their actions, habits, posture, and talk (Snow & Anderson, 1987).

Thus, men will deploy masculinity in some contexts but not others (Connell, 1995).

Just teenagers?

A teenager does not experience the angst of constructing a self in a void but rather in the middle of a world of societal expectations and pressures that require public performances to "keep face" and, in some instances, to maintain physical and emotional safety. (Brown et al. 1994, 814).

avatars

…constructing a personal home page can be seen as shaping not only the materials but also (in part through manipulating the various materials) one’s identity. (Chandler 1998)

Who am I, Sam?

I am not who I think I amI am not who you think I amI am who I think you think that I am

it's not "You are what you eat," it's "You eat what you think you are."

Otherness- who are you?

If our identity is not immutable (fixed) and requires shaping, manipulating and, generally, working on

What does that means for us (me) when we (I) work with OTHERS?

Otherness otherness is defined by difference, typically

difference marked by outward signs like race and gender.

otherness has also been associated predominantly with marginalized people, those who by virtue of their difference from the dominant group, have been disempowered, robbed of a voice in the social, religious, and political world.

marginalized people cannot tell their own story, cannot define themselves, but rather, must submit to the descriptions assigned to them by the dominant group.

Performativity

“Performativity emphasizes everyday behaviour, the discursive power of what one is doing, and the power of this repetition to shape one's identity”

“Performativity marks Otherness and has a potential for the spatial study of the visible Other as one who is in or out of place”

“ability to move easily and independently is a fundamental hegemonic assumption that categorizes bodies who are unable to do so as `deviant', and makes them invisible even when they are present”

Orna, B. (2007)

The problem of ‘the Other’

Is our understanding of ‘the Other’ correct?

Is it a projection of ourselves Is it a projection of what we are not? Is our conception limited,

prejudicial? To what extent to we construct the

Other?

Preparation for the next workshop

NILE will host five papers on the subjects below. Read and research more widely

Social Tagging ADHD Marines v Fedayeen Harry Potter Graffiti

What are your observations regarding identity work in the welfare group context you are exploring?

How are your ‘social problems’ being constructed?

References

Sampson, E. E. (1993) Celebrating the Other. A dialogic account of human nature, Hemel Hempstead: Harvester/Wheatsheaf. 207 + x pages.

Very clear introduction to some of the debates around notions of the self.

Burkitt, I. (1990) Social Selves. Theories of the social formation of personality, London: Sage. 225 pages.

Interdisciplinary overview of theories of the social formation of personality.

Damasio, A. (2000) The Feeling of What Happens. Body and emotion in the making of consciousness, London: Vintage. 

This books looks first at the how processes in the brain engender, or constitute, or be, conscious experiences (or images - what Damasio calls the 'movie in the brain'). The second half turns to the nature of selfhood - 'how the appearance of an owner and observer for the movie is generated within the movie'.

Mead, G. H. and C. W. Morris (1934) Mind,Self, and Society from the Standpoint of a Social Behaviorist, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Mead/socialself.htm http://www.brocku.ca/MeadProject/

inventory5.html Blumer, Herbert (1969). Symbolic Interactionism:

Perspective and Method. Berkeley: University of California Press

Smith, M. K. (1996, 2001) 'Selfhood', the encyclopaedia of informal education, www.infed.org/biblio/b-self.htm. Last update: 2 July 2008

References Hebdige, Dick. (1979). Subculture: The Meaning of Style. London: Methuen. Goffman, Erving (1969): The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life.

Harmondsworth: Penguin CHANDLER, Daniel (1998). ‘Personal Home Pages and the Construction of

Identities on the Web’ [WWW document] URL. BROWN, J CR DYKERS, JR STEELE & AB WHITE. (1994). ‘Teenage Room

Culture: Where Media and Identities Intersect’, Communication Research 21: pp813-27.

Snow, D., & Anderson, L. (1987). Identity work among the homeless: The verbal construction and avowal of personal identities. American Journal of Sociology, 92, 1336–1371.

Connell, R.W. 1995. Masculinities. Berkeley: University of California Press Einwohner, R. L. (2007). "Leadership, Authority, and Collective Action:

Jewish Resistance in the Ghettos of Warsaw and Vilna." American Behavioral Scientist 50(10): 1306-1326.

Suler, J. R. (2002). "Identity Management in Cyberspace." Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies 4: 455-460.

Wallace, P. (1999). Your online persona, the psychology of impression formation. The psychology of the Internet (pp. 14-37). London: Cambridge University Press.

Orna, B. (2007). "The performative landscape of going-to-work: on the edge of a Jewish ultraorthodox neighborhood." Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 25(5): 803 - 831