Who are you? What can social science tell us?

Critical and Perspective in Media - Media and Collective Identity


What are the processes that George Herbert Mead argues link the personal to the external?

The process is how you look at yourself from the outside. You have to think about how others see you and be self-conscious about the way you look. For example the job interview scenario used in the reading task was a good example. We think about how we want to look smart for them but then what happens if it is a hot day and you were in a suite then you may look uncomfortable and not so smart. You need to think about how you are going to be seen so we have to imagine what we look like from the outside.

What is Mead referring to when he uses the term ‘symbolizing’?

Symbolizing is our language where words operate as symbols. Gestures, pictures and images can also represent something else so they to are part of symbolizing.

What is happening when we visualise ourselves?

When we visualise ourselves we symbolise ourselves through the clothes we wear and our behaviour. Using the job interview example we imagine ourselves at the interview either in the negative position or the positive.

How do we ’signal’ our identities to others?

We signal ourselves through representation and symbols. For example how we speak, the clothes we wear, badges, flags, scarves and uniforms. So if I was to wear a school uniform the was commonly recognised in the community then I would be signalling to others I attend that school.

What ’choice’ does Judith Williamson argue that we have?

Williamson says that we have the choice on how represent ourselves to others. She also says that others will understand the choice that we make and that in different countries were cultures differ then the clothes we choose to wear will be interpreted differently.







How do Mead’s and Williamson’s arguments develop our understanding of identity?

If identity is how I see myself and how others see me then identity is a more deeper process of our life’s then I first thought. We have to be able to imagine ourselves which isn’t always easy, to reflect who we are and how we appear to others.

What conclusions does Erving Goffman reach in his analysis of everyday interaction conversations and encounters? What theoretical argument does he offer as a result?

Goffman suggests that how we present ourselves to others is like acting, or performing part of a script that have already been written for us. He says that we act a variety of different roles which is like the characters and parts in plays, but we bring are own interpretations and expectations to it all. This theory is quite the same as investing in our identity but more as having a personal commitment to our identity. Therefore this gives us more of a detailed ability to read people and how we get the message about who we/or are.

How is Goffmans ‘presentation of self’ different from ‘investing in an identity’?

They are different because they each focus on different aspects of identity. Investing in identity is more about our daily interaction with others and how speak, whereas the presentation of self is all about our appearance. Clothes and gestures and crucial to this part of presentation of self. In addition to this it is understood that the presentation of self is more revealing that investing in identity. For example if we twist our fingers in job interview continuously then this is interested as a nervous gesture, which could be giving off the wrong impression, whilst through voice we are trying to give off through voice.

Not all of our actions are conscious or explicit. What are the consequences of this?

Identity relies upon are conscious and active presentation, but it might also involve thoughts and feelings about which we might be so conscious of. Unintentional signs such as a biting of the lip or slips of the tongue are manifestations of the unconscious mind.

How do Goffman’s arguments develop our understanding of the social dimensions of identity and the relationship between identity and roles?

His emphasis on the social dimensions of identity and the relationship between identity tell us more about the social aspects and social exchanges between people. Goffmans approach to it all suggests that there are links between the society in which we live and the limitations offered by the or parts we play in society, because the scripts, in sense, have already been written.


What is the Freudian unconscious?

The Freudian unconscious is an idea which has passed into everyday language in the western societies through popular culture, the advertising industry and through psychoanalytically inspired practices like therapy.


What mechanisms, of which we might not be consciously aware, determine our identities?

We may not be familiar and not consciously aware of Freudian slips, when the word we say wasn’t actually the word we intended to say. This reveals something about our hidden desires. For example in a students essay they wrote ‘ of coffee’ instead of ‘of course’. This would suggest that it might be time for them to have a break.

How according to Freud does identity emerge?

According to Freud identity emerges through and from childhood. Through early development children repress all their anti-social needs, wants and all the things they are not allowed. Therefore this repressed material enter the unconscious mind and is revealed through dreams and slips of the tongue. Who we are is not given in advance, we are not born with identity, but it emerges in a number of different forms through a series of identifications which combine and emerge an infinite number of forms so there never is one fixed, coherent identity but several in play.

What is signified by the term ‘identification’ when used in the context of psychoanalysis?

Identification in the psychological process of association between oneself and something else. (originally someone else). Identification does not just involve copying but it involves you taking that identity into yourself.

What impacts can sex, sexuality, and gender have on identity?

Sex, gender and sexuality impacts our identity because Freud says that children are seen as having sexual desires of a diverse kind. Freud argues the most important physiological drive in sexuality. Identification with the parent of the same sex is vital for satisfactory development of the child into adulthood. This has many implications on our individual identities. Freud’s focus on the unconscious adds to the understanding of the process in which we work to form our identities. It suggest that we bring childhood experiences, even those that we are not conscious about into the decisions we make as adults.