This daring presentation takes a look into the social and cultural perspectives of what makes up a person's identity and explores "Black culture" attacking your identity. By Dionne Willams

1. SOCIAL, CULTURAL, AND
PERSONAL IDENTITY:
WHO ARE YOU?
Presented by Dionne Williams

2. Learning Outcomes
■ Gain the knowledge of where identity comes from
■ Understand why you are unique
■ Discuss the difference between playing a role and personal
identity as well as how these two interact with each other
■ Gain knowledge of identity activation and demonstrate how
people activate their identity based on 3 levels
■ Understand identity in a social and cultural settings
■ Explore what Black Culture means in the Western world
■ Gain insight to labelling and how it effects self-esteem

3. Introduction
I want us to explore the concept of “identity” in a framework
of social constructs that relates to the world arounds us and
the impact it has on our self-esteem.
■ “Identity”- labels with attached meanings that defines how
you see yourself; as well as the qualities, beliefs, and
expressions that you hold and/or share in a social group.
■ “Self-esteem” – is a reflective process where an individual
evaluates how he/she feels about themselves and their
worth. Self esteem includes beliefs about oneself.
■ So self is in two parts, what you think about the self and
how you feel about the self, which impacts how you relate
to others and the world around you.

4. Where Does My Identity Comes From?

5. Identity Formation
■ Since we are born into a structural society, we recognise that we need to
find ourselves in a world filled with categories/classifications and when we
identify ourselves similar to classifications, it is called identification in
identity theory (MCcall & Simmons, 1978). By going through the
identification process, an identity is born.
■ Identity comes from relating to the world around us. According to Social
identity theory (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher and Wetherell, 1987), our
concept of self comes from the social groups we identify ourselves strongly
with which is called the in-group and we tend to be biased to the positive
characteristics of that group such as status or power and be negatively
biased towards the out-group, seeing them with undesirable characteristics
we do not want to be associated with.
■ Consequently, who we identify ourselves will feed our self-esteem.
■ Example

6. How Am I Unique?
■ You are unique…. because you identify yourselves
with a large number of social categories available
within society, creating your own personal identity.
■ Personal identity are your goals, feelings, values
and desires that makes you function differently
than anyone else in this room even if you are an
identical twin!

7. Are your roles and identity of self the same
thing?

8. Playing Your Role VS Being Yourself
■ Role is someone you are playing (behaviour wise) that has to be a certain standard due to expectations
related to that role. Performing a role requires getting something out from acting a certain way within
that role, i.e. employment, favour, obedience, money, etc.
■ While being yourself is someone you are being. Your concept of you is linked to the meaning you give
yourself despite roles, situations and in group memberships.
■ Personal Example
■ You can play a role that verifies your personal identity which has a common value. Thus there is room
for negotiating being yourself and playing a role if the meaning you hold is similar.
■ Example
■ However, if your role is in direct conflict with your personal identity then you are more likely to give
higher importance to being true to yourself (Stets, 1995).
■ Example
■ It is the same with when you are identifying with the in-groups, you will maintain more your sense of
personal identity.
■ Example

9. “A Crisis Always Reveals a Person’s True
Character”

10. Identity Activation
■ Identity is not situation dependent.
■ We invoke our identity to verify who we say we are in any given situation.
■ In social theory, it is hypothesised that we see our identification on three levels:
1. The superordinate level – where you relate on the largest social construct scale
dependent on context e.g. “I am African”
2. The intermediate level- e.g. “I am Nigerian”
3. The subordinate level- Where you can relate on much smaller social construct
scale dependent on context e.g. “I am Yoruba”.
■ Thus dependent on the context in which we give ourselves meaning to our identity
we can choose a level to relate to as well as how important the difference means
to us.
■ i.e. I may say I am “African” in an ethnically diverse group, if I am amongst a
homogenous group such as a black group then I may say I am “Nigerian”, and if I
am amongst a Nigerian group, I may identify myself as “Yoruba”.

11. Identity In A Social Construct

12. ■ In society, we are normalised to a way of living and way of being.
■ Why is this? In social identity theory, we call the cognitive process,
depersonalisation, where an individual sees themselves as an embodiment of
meanings and norms (values) of a social category, we see as the “in-group”
sees. It is the membership of the in-group that sets norms for our behaviour,
appearance, rituals, and labelling.
■ It is the depersonalisation that allows us to comply to the social construct’s
ideas, customs and behaviours, social stereotyping, ethnocentrism, unity,
cooperation, altruism, and emotional oneness (Stets and Burkes, 2000). And in
turn, when a person depersonalises themselves in a culture, we seek validation
of belonging by acting according to the culture we belong to.
■ Examples
■ Why do people do this? Mainly to fit in the social setting we are in. Our identity
in a social construct benefits us greatly as it elevates our self-esteem which
motivates us to learn more about ourselves, reduce uncertainty in a life of
chaos, and to experience validation of being authentic to self, mastery of self,
and acting according to the social norms in that social category.

13. Does that mean our identity is deeply
rooted in culture?

14. Cultural Identity
■ Well, yes according to Cultural identity.
■ Cultural Identity is an individual feeling that they belong to
a group with its own distinct culture that unites individuals
as “at oneness”.
■ It is part of an individual’s self-conception and self-
perception which includes nationality, ethnicity, religion,
social class and social groups.
■ Let us look specifically at “Black Culture” in the western
modern world.

15. What Is Black Culture?

16. ■ Black culture is a formation of ideas, customs, and social behaviour of people
from African descent that is a lifestyle made out of assumptions pertaining to
being Black. It's a fluid and multi-layered. Often hard to describe.
■ CNN 2014 article entitled 5 things to know about black culture and the writer
commented on Black culture saying:
■ “"Black Culture" is a lifestyle standard made of assumptions about black
identity, often used successfully by marketers, studio heads, fashion brands and
music labels to make money… Black culture may have been born in black
communities, or created by black Americans. But when appropriated for
commerce, there is a danger of mistaking "Black Culture" for actual cultural
EXPERIENCE. That's where the myth begins, and it can devalue real human
experiences… We are often told what being black is by people who aren't. Up
and coming black hip hop artists are moulded to appeal to the masses by white
label executives. Television shows with black characters might have no black
writers or directors...”

17. Black Culture: Food For Thought
■ Could the article have a point?
■ Is our cultural identity coming from Black communities nowadays or are
black communities told their cultural identity by out-groups through catchy
songs, soaps, celebrities, fashion gurus and mainstream media?
■ This is important to ponder on because it is relevant, it is effecting the future
generations born into a society that has social categories/classifications that
will try and put on them which may be hurtful to their identity formation.
■ There is a saying in my house: ”If you don’t teach yourself who you are then
the world will tell you who you are.”
■ Could be it even conceivable that the Black culture that is “appropriated for
commerce” we are consuming and upholding are actually choke holding us
to keep us in an identity crisis and dysfunctionality?

18. Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones But
Words Will Never Hurt Me

19. Labelling Theory
■ Labelling theory is the theory of how the self-identity and behaviour of individuals
may be determined or influenced by the terms used to describe or classify them. It
is associated with the concepts of self-fulfilling prophecy and stereotyping.
■ So maybe words do hurt us….
■ The labels that are attached to you and I are socially constructed and
reconstructed through social interactions we have with each other. We obtain
labels from how we (the minority) and others (the majority) view our tendencies or
behaviours, which consciously and subconsciously impacts our self-esteem and
intrude on how we experience reality.
■ Remember the CNN article said: “there is a danger of mistaking "Black Culture" for
actual cultural EXPERIENCE. That's where the myth begins, and it can devalue real
human experiences”
■ Labels describe human experiences (real or perceived), give me examples of
labels attached to identity.

20. “Black”
■ Let’s look at the label “BLACK” as an example.
■ What are the labels or thoughts attached to being
Black in today’s British society and media (majority
out-groups)?
■ Black – (in-group bias) power, strength, soulful,
original, gods, African, beginning of humanity,
heritage, love, honest, unashamed, rich history and
culture, unique, equal, historical, slavery,
overcoming, justice, resilience, beautiful,
togetherness, fun.

22. ■ Black- (out-group bias) crime, slavery,
aggressive, hip hop, chocolate, sporty, welfare,
good dancer, arrogant, attitude, N word,
ebony, gold teeth, rappers, weed smokers,
play the victims, promiscuous, thugs, loud,
single parents, absent father, crab in a barrel
mentality, baby mamas, been in prison, too
forgiving, stuck in the past, always late, lazy,
dirty, non-educated.

24. ■ Are these representations of the label of “Black” that
stereotypes Black British people and encourages self-
fulfilment of both positive and negative social norms within
Black Culture?
■ This is why I named my talk “Who are you?” I am
challenging you to challenge yourself to define who you are
on personal level but more so on a bigger level- socially and
culturally.
■ It is important to challenge at times as our identity as it is
rooted in belonging to a culture as we act and accept norms
of perception, values and behaviours.
■ Isn’t about time, we reject the world’s teaching of who we
are and teach the world who we are?
■ Well, it starts with answering a simple but complex
question…

25. Who are you?

26. References
■ McCall, George J. and J. L. Simmons. 1978. Identities and Interactions. New York: Free Press.
■ Simien, Justine. 2014. “5 things to know about black culture now”. CNN Website:
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/02/25/living/justin-simien-black-culture-now/
■ Stets, Jan E. 1995. “Role identities and person identities: Gender identity, mastery identity,
and controlling one's partner”. Sociological Perspectives 38.2: 129-150.
■ Stets, Jan E., and Peter J. Burke. 2000 “Identity theory and social identity theory.” Social
psychology quarterly: 224-237.
■ Turner, John C., Hogg, Michael A., Oakes, Penelope J., Reicher, Stephen D., Wetherell,
Margaret S. 1987. Rediscovering the social group: A self-categorization theory. New York:
Basil Blackwell.