Indeed, as shown earlier, “our personal characteristics derive from our socialisation within the group (or, rather, groups) to which we belong. . . . Thus, individual identities will be both components and reflections of particular social (or cultural) ones” (Edwards, 2009, p. 20). In fact, the overlap does not occur only between social identity and personal identity but crosses freely to the three types of identity. Such overlap is likely to be the reason behind Brewer and Gardner’s description of all of them as “social selves” (1996, p. 83). In addition, Llamas’ definition of social identity mentioned that social identity is part and partial of both individual identity and collective identity and that this concept, social identity, pervades in the writing of researchers and scholars who investigate human behavior both individual and collective (Llamas, 2006, p. 95). Another mention of the strong ties between the three types of identity, personal, collective, and social identities, came from Lawler who asserted that “there is no aspect of identity that lies outside social relations” (Lawler, 2014, p. 180).
Markers of Identity
No one can argue that someone engages in self, collective, and/or social interpretation as a “tabula rasa,” for identity markers are born with the person. Indeed, from the day s/he is born, the individual has his or her chains of markers, personal traits (age, ideology, and sex) and shared attributes (cultures, ethnicity, and religion) based on which s/he relies when defining himself or herself. This is what led to the general agreement or ascription to the statement that people have multiple identities. Although a complete list of the factors affecting the construction of identity is an impossible attainment since they are related to the person and the social world with which s/he interacts, a “laundry list” of some of the most common ones, that are discussed in the literature, namely, gender, race and ethnicity, occupation, and place, is charted out. To eschew redundancy, language is held for later discussion.
To start with gender, Harris (1995) started his book, Messages Men Hear: Constructing Masculinities, with the following passage:
All boys are born innocent, capable of becoming Charles Manson or Dr Martin Luther King Jr. With constant love and nourishment boys have the capacity to grow into cuddly teddy bears. With hatred, abuse, and abandonment they can become fierce grizzlies. Young boys become men by responding to situational demands and social pressures. Surrounded with expectations about how they, as men, ought to behave, boys have to sift through various demands placed upon them by their culture, their associates, their teachers, their friends, and their family to construct their own gender identities. (p. 9)
Clearly, based on biological differences and as a result of socialization, people construct gender identities. It seems also that individuals are rewarded by the different social actors, say, parents and professors, for constructing such identities and thus conforming to gender roles which are assigned to them. The concept “gender identity” refers to “an individual’s own feelings of whether he or she is a woman or man, a girl or a boy. In essence [sic] gender identity is self attribution of gender” (Kessler & McKenna, 1978, p. 8). It is clear, then, that gender is a significant marker of identity.
Furthermore, people are frequently situated on the axes of ethnicity and race. However, before providing an example, it is worth clearing up the terms “ethnicity” and “race” and clearing some common misunderstanding of them.
“[R]ace” is a social category based on the identification of (1) a physical marker transmitted through reproduction and (2) individual, group and cultural attributes associated with that marker. Defined as such, race is, then, a form of ethnicity, but distinguished from other forms of ethnicity by the identification of distinguishing physical characteristics, which, among other things, make it more difficult for members of the group to change their identity. (Smelser, Wilson, & Mitchell, 2001, p. 3, emphasis in original)
Smelser, Wilson, and Mitchell do not provide a more detailed definition to ethnicity, in the above citation, as they did with the term “race.” Below is another example that explains the two terms and thus distinguishes between them. Race is associated “with biologically based differences between human groups, differences typically observable in skin color, hair texture, eye shape, and other physical attributes. “Ethnicity” tends to be associated with culture, pertaining to such factors as language, religion, and nationality” (Bobo, 2001, p. 267). Bobo (2001) further added: “[a]lthough perceived racial distinctions often result in sharper and more persistent barriers than ethnic distinctions, this is not invariably the case, and both share elements of presumed common descent or ascriptive inheritance” (p. 267). The cited references demonstrate that race and ethnicity are different terms. There are some criteria that separate the two terms. The criteria are summed up primarily in the cultural icons and language, for example. While both terms point out to the physical appearance, the cultural icons are particular markers of ethnicity.
The definitions of the terms “ethnicity” and “race,” provided above, show that the terms categorize people into different categories and thus mark them from other significant groups. The following citation shows that people single out others and classify them based on their race and ethnicity. “people confuse me for an African American. . . . They ask me, ‘Are you Black?’ I’m like, ‘No, I’m Hispanic. . . . ’ Because . . . the way I talk, my hair . . . I use a lot of slang. You can confuse . . . Dominicans as African American by their color” (Bailey, 2000, p. 565). The excerpt illustrates race and ethnicity in action. The speaker said that he is always marked out based on his physical appearance (race and ethnicity) and his language (ethnicity).
Moreover, the individual’s role is a fundamental marker to his or her identity. Such role can be an occupation or a family role. According to Weaver, Reid, Valien, and Johnson (1939), occupation refers to any employment for which wages is to be received (p. 86). The role of the family, remarked White and Klein (2002), refers to a partnership between members of the family, such as father-daughter, husband-wife and so forth (p. 96). Based on such roles, people define and are defined by others. Many organizations, companies, and institutions give their workers a particular cloth that sets them apart from those who do not work in them. When people also are asked to introduce themselves, they tend to identify themselves based on their roles. For instance,
Japanese businessmen employed by large corporations have traditionally worn a small lapel pin to signal their company affiliation . . . some [people] in the United States . . . wear a polo shirt or a tie with a company logo. . . . In Japan a person’s organizational identity is so important that during introductions the company’s name is given before the individual’s name . . . In the United States an individual is introduced first by his or her name, followed by the organization. (Samovar, Porter, McDaniel, & Roy, 2007, p. 222)
The above examples offer insight to how occupation stresses identity. People practice their identity on daily basis based on their affiliation to their job organizations.
In addition to gender, race, ethnicity, and occupation, place has a great impact on the way people define themselves. Place is a “geographical space that has acquired meaning as a result of a person’s interaction with the space” (Hauge, 2007, p. 3). Place identity, then, is defined as a “potpourri of memories, conceptions, interpretations, ideas, and related feelings about specific physical settings, as well as types of settings” (Proshansky, Fabian, & Kaminoff, 1983, p. 60). Many theories have been developed in recent decades to explain the impact of place on identity, place-identity theory, social identity theory, and identity process theory, to name but few. Nevertheless, since the scope of the study is beyond such theories and