Major Theories Regarding the Nature of Personal and Social Identity

This essay will be looking to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the social identity theory with studies to support.

Anger and resentment is another issue. The teacher may feel resentment towards a parent that has a good job; attends power lunches; and dresses professionally with jewelry and make-up. She also resents the freedom the parent has to dress, attend meetings, and client dinners.

Society has a way of making assumptions based on one’s physical characteristics. Often at times we categorize individuals to a particular social group. In regard to society’ perception of an individual this however, contributes to the development of social construction of racism. Most people want to be identified as individuals rather than a member of specific social group. As a result, our social identity contains different categories or components that were influenced or imposed. For example, I identify as a, Jamaican, Puerto Rican and a person of color. I identify racially as a person of color and ethically as Jamaican and Puerto Rican. According to Miller and Garren it’s a natural human response for people to make assumptions solely

No matter how much a person desires to live according to their personal autonomy, he or she will never escape the influence of societal forces. Explicitly or subtlety, these forces shape our individuality. One intriguing manner that these societal forces manifests itself in is our name. As Ruth Graham writes, “It’s becoming increasingly clear today that names carry a wealth of information about the world around us, the family we arrived in, the moment we were born—and that they mark us as part of cultural currents bigger than we realize.” Names alone provide evidence that individuals are made by interactions with social institutions and groups. Ultimately, the inescapable nature of society’s influence demands individuals to ponder how much personal autonomy is actually autonomous and to what extent does the pursuit of personal autonomy lead to a life of emptiness and vanity.

Social identity theory proposed by Tajfel & Turner (2004) is a theory of group membership and behaviour which has made significant contributions in explaining in-group favouritism, out-group denigration, competition and other interactions of an individual among social groups (Korte, 2007; Brown, 2000; Tajfel & Turner, 2004). Social identity theory can be defined as an individual’s sense of who they are based on the group that they belong to through a process of self-categorisation and depersonalisation (Tajfel & Turner, 2004). In this essay, I will define social identity theory through its three mental processes involved in group evaluation which are: social identification which is a process whereby we are placed into certain

There were a lot of challenges that came with being a part of an immigrant family in America. My father was away most of the time due to work while my mother was a stay-at-home mom. I just entered the first grade when another one of my father’s business attempts failed, leaving my family in a very financially unstable state. My father’s lack of success in achieving the American Dream left him no choice but to resort to back to Korea to provide for my family. It is actually common in many Asian households to have the father supporting the family while working in another country. It was not that the American Dream is not achievable, but there were opportunity gaps that affected my father’s ability to succeed (McManus, 2014).

Stereotypes have been around since the beginning and continue to hurt the lives of certain people in society. Due to stereotypes and prejudice made by certain people, the author, Evan Hunter, successfully demonstrated through the story “On the Sidewalk Bleeding” the consequences of stereotyping. The story focuses on a sixteen year old boy named Andy, and his last moments being alive after being stabbed by a rival gang known as the Guardians. Andy was stereotyped because of his purple jacket that identified him as a member of the Royals. While he is reflecting on his life, four people come by but do not take the time to help. The drunk man

Personal identity is essential in the human experience. Identity is complex and can be broken down into two main groups: introspective identity, and bodily identity. Introspective identity is based off of the groups, mentalities, or beliefs that you align yourself with, and bodily identity is based off of the physical side of yourself. Whether physical or introspective, your identity impacts every action you take. Whether choices ranging from what colors you prefer to which college you want to attend are primarily based off of your introspective identity, which is a combination of both memory and consciousness, physical identity impacts how others perceive you. Consciousness is mainly the awareness of bodily identity as well as continuous introspective identify, while memory is awareness of introspective identity. These two different facets of identity are imperative in the distinction between bodily identity and introspective identity. In means of personal identity introspective identity (which is evident in memory), is essential, while bodily identity (based partially in consciousness) has less credit.

The theory I chose for the annotated bibliography was Social Identity Theory. Social identity is the categorization between individuals who have similarities and can identify themselves within the category (Abram & Hogg, 1988). Social comparison is when we divide the world into groups that we are part of which are called the in groups and the relevant groups that are not part of our group that are called outgroup. Self-concept is brought from how you see yourself and how a person connects to social groups. (Turner & Tajfel, 1979). Overall, this relates to how we perceive ourselves, how you see ourselves and present ourselves in public.

In Don’s lecture, he discusses the dialectical model of Identity formation, which includes three components or circles that interact. The subjective reality, the objective reality and Indigenous objective reality. Subjective reality is the individual’s identity that is comprised of someone’s thoughts and feelings. Objective reality is outside of the self, encompassing the culture in mainstream society, such as institutions, history, capitalism and rules. The indigenous objective reality is influenced by both mainstream society and Aboriginal culture. People’s feelings and behaviours are likely to mimic those of the urban people around them.

My family shaped my personal and social identity at a micro level by being the first set of influencers the moment I was born. My personal identity is significantly influenced by my family through the approach that my parents have taken to raise and nurture me. The results of my parents raising me is shown through the behaviour and beliefs that I embody. For example, because of my family I have always been aware that there is a God. In consequence, my compliant behaviour towards religion has already been constructed at a young age. Moreover, my social identity’s structure was shaped by my family through they way they have socially interacted with me. My micro level interactions with my family throughout time has created a deeply rooted influence within me. The influence that my family has had on my social identity is demonstrated in the way that I respond in certain social situations. For example, through behavioural observation as a child I have learned not to speak back to my parents when they are lecturing me.

Who are you? Who am I? These are questions that we all ponder at some point or another in our lives. As human beings we are seemingly inundated with the desire to classify and categorise. We are constantly defining and analysing the differences that we observe in the world, it seems only natural that we would apply this method of classification to our position within our society. More specifically, we want to understand our social identities and this can be achieved by acknowledging which groups we identify most with.

Social identity theory, it is a person’s sense that is based around the group they are in, either by their personal identity or with different kinds of social identities. That is, people will try to improve their own image of themselves. The theory was proposed by Henri Tajfel. People can increase their self-esteem by both their own achievement and interaction with a successful group of people. This shows the importance of social belonging. This theory is based around three mental processes, social categorization, social identification and social comparison.

Many people question themselves, what is it exactly that makes them unique? What is it that defines them as a unique person that no one in the world possesses? In philosophy, these questions do not have just one answer, and all answers are correct depending on which theory appeals most and makes sense to you. In general, there are two ways people approach this question, some say that a person’s identity is the “self” that carries all of their experiences, thoughts, memories, and consciousness (ego theorists), and some say that a person’s identity is just a bundle of experiences and events that a person has been through in their life, these people deny that the “self” exists (bundle theorists). In this paper, I will be arguing that a person’s identity is just a bundle of experiences, denying the self and the memory criterion.

SIT (Tajfel et al., 1971; Tajfel & Turner, 1979) has been explained briefly in the Introduction, which provided an overview on the nature of its construction (Galang et al., 2015) and its implications on ingroup inclusion, intergroup behavior, and self-esteem (Brewer & Yuki, 2007). This theory is further discussed here, particularly its conception of group identification and esteem, to give context to BIRG and the framework of analysis that will be used to analyze the phenomenon.