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2 - Decentering Histories of Identity

from Part I - The Origin and Development of the Concept of Identity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 October 2021

By
Michael Bamberg  and
Martin Dege
Edited by
Michael Bamberg ,
Carolin Demuth  and
Meike Watzlawik
Michael Bamberg
Affiliation:
Clark University, Massachusetts
Carolin Demuth
Affiliation:
Aalborg University, Denmark
Meike Watzlawik
Affiliation:
Sigmund Freud University, Berlin
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Summary

Contemplating the history of identity faces seemingly insurmountable challenges – mostly raising suspicion: from whose perspective and value for whom? This chapter assumes multiple histories of identity and proceeds in three steps. By sifting through how the term identity intersects in contemporary language use with neighboring concepts (such as self, subject/subjectivity, individual/authenticity, and consciousness/conscience), we filter out a core narrative for contemporary identity discourses. Basic to modern identity is the assumption of an interior navigation-bridge from where three kinds of decision-territories are navigated: (i) temporal stability and change; (ii) how to blend in and differentiate from others; and (iii) how to engage as agentive subject or as being subjected to forces in the world. In this narrative, the internal command-bridge is accessible by and to the self using (self-)reflective means. The central part of our contribution subjects this kind of identity narrative to a form of historical interrogation in relation to (i) how it came into being in a particular region (Europe) and at a particular time (the Enlightenment); (ii) which discourses were included and which ones were systemically excluded; and (iii) how it was possible that this identity narrative gained power in everyday sense-making in general and in the discipline of psychology in particular. In a final section, we consider whether there are ways to conceptualize alternative narratives of identity that can inspire innovative discourses to theorize and empirically investigate identity.

Keywords

Identityhistorymodernityagencyinteriorityindigeneity
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Identity , pp. 25 - 56
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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