OUGD501: Context of Practice 2 (Seminar) - Identity

Recap from the lecture

• Essentialism 
• Physiognomy - the outlook, because people are born in a certain environment, having a certain identity. 
• Anti-Essentialism - Society shapes us as people, and we don’t have any defining characteristics, but we’re formed by socialism.  

Identity and the other in visual representation

• Creation of identities
• concepts of otherness
• Analysis of visual example
• Identity - who we are and how others perceive who we are
• Identity creation - What makes you, you?
• The way you dress/present yourself
• How you speak/mannerisms
• Where you’re from
• Level of social skills/who you surround yourself with
• Interests
• Upbringing/background/genetics
• Physical Attributes (deformities)
• Fear
• Sense of Humour 
• Skills and abilities/what you can do for society
• Religion and Beliefs
• Gender
• Sexuality

How do you express your identity?

• The way you dress/present yourself - conspicuous consumption
• Your way of speaking
• Life style choices
• Body modifications
• Job/Profession/Vocation
• Emotional Availability 
• Social Networking
• Reality vs projected identity.

Circuit of Culture - Stuart Hall

• Culture is the framework within which our identities are formed, expressed and regulated.
• Identity formation
• Process from psychoanalysis

Jacques LACAN

• The ‘hommelette’ (french pun - man/omelette)
• The ‘Mirror Stage’ - the key point of identity formation in the individual
• The Mirror Stage
• Sense of self (subjectivity) built on:
• an illusion of wholeness
• receiving views from others
• Result = own subjectivity is fragile

Constructing the ‘other’

• Problems: relives on the assumption of position and radical otherness
• In the same way that we create our own identities we
• Identification
• Shores up unstable identities though the illusion of unity. 
• Shared fashions, belief systems, values
• — Subterranean Values (Matza, 1961)

Find an example of othering.