THERE ARE MORE WAYS OF SEEING PEOPLE THAN IN THE STRAITJACKET OF RACE, CREED OR WHATEVER WE MEAN BY 'CIVILISATION'. VARIETY IS THE NAME OF THE IDENTITY GAME - AND A SAFER WAY TO GO THAN CONFRONTATION IN THE NAME OF DIFFERENCE
This article is a critique, first, of the theory of identity advanced by Judith Butler and many of the feminist critics of identity politics, and, second, of identity politics itself. I argue that Butler's rejection of the modernist subject for its opposite, the fictional, substanceless subject, is untenable. Looking to object relations theory, I argue instead for a concept of the subject as an ungrounded ground, occupying a middle ground between the postmodern and the modern subject. With regard to identity politics I argue that instead of populating the political realm with multiple identities, we should instead remove identity entirely from the political realm.
In: Panoeconomicus: naučno-stručni časopis Saveza Ekonomista Vojvodine ; scientific-professional journal of Economists' Association of Vojvodina, Band 61, Heft 4, S. 503-515
With the intensification of neoliberalism, it is useful to examine how some individuals might cope with the irrationality of the system. Neoliberalism cloaks the execution of the corporate agenda behind rhetorical manipulation that advocates for limited government. The corollary absence of government involvement on behalf of the citizenry writ large disarms the means of social redress for the individual. Democracy funded and fueled by corporate power thereby disenfranchises the individual, provoking some to search for empowerment through identity politics. The argument set forth suggests that individuals construct, reinforce, or escalate allegiance to identities as a coping mechanism, some of which manifest in violent identity politics.
Many authors have discussed issues connected with the EU's quest for more legitimacy through establishing a collective identity. A plethora of publications stress that collective identity contributes in a crucial manner to societal and political cohesion among EU citizens and EU elites. The EU has been trying to construct a collective identity by applying identity technologies towards its own citizens. These identity technologies work in a top-down manner. Adapted from the source document.
Discusses the legacies of external domination & totalitarianism on nation building in post-Soviet Ukraine. Nation building in Ukraine is placed in a historical context showing how many contemporary Ukrainian characteristics existed during earlier periods in other countries. Challenged is the view that language should be perceived as the key -- if not the only -- marker of national identity in Ukraine. Instead, other elements of national identity are explored to show how nation building is developing in Ukraine. Russian-speaking Ukrainians, therefore, should not be regarded as "disloyal" to Ukrainian independence & as supporters of pro-Russian separatism, a view often held in the academic community. 5 Tables. Adapted from the source document.
Abstract This article explores the history and meaning of the term identity politics, along with the term identity itself. It focuses on the history of the deployment of this language within social movements and academic political debates, attempting to trace its relation to the prospects for emancipatory politics.
AbstractThe study of youth identity and its formations today is diffuse and widely expansive, charted across a variety of disciplines, including Sociology, Anthropology, Psychology, Education, History, English, and Cultural Studies. This review essay is largely concerned with youth identity formation as a socially bound process as understood by sociologists. I sketch some of the thematic currents that guide contemporary sociologists' investigations of youth identity formation as socially constituted process, and some of its exemplars. I highlight two conceptual framings of note: (a) youth identity formation as 'project' captured in the concept of 'identity work' and (b) youth identity formation as historically contingent phenomenon shaped by changes to the life course and changes in conceptions of the self in late modernity.
How do corporations attempt to regulate the ways middle managers draw on discourses centred on 'effectiveness' and 'ethics' in their identity work, and how do these individuals respond? We analyse the discursive struggle over what it meant to be a competent manager at Disneyland, where middle managers were encouraged to construe their selves in ways that emphasized 'being effective' over 'being ethical', and managers responded with identity work that positioned them as searching for the practical wisdom (phronesis) to make decisions that were both effective and moral. The theoretical contribution we make is twofold. First, we analyse processes of identity regulation and identity work at Disneyland, highlighting divergences between corporate injunctions and middle managers' appropriations of them, regarding what it meant to be a practically wise manager. Second, we discuss a phronetic identity narrative template, contestable both by organizations and managers, in which people are positioned as questing for the practical wisdom to make decisions that are both moral and effective, and phronesis as an image by which scholars may analyse identities and identity work. This leads us to a more nuanced understanding of middle manager identities and the scope they have to constitute their selves as moral agents.