learntoquestion ltq discussions

There are many factors that affect how we see ourselves, but I think the opinions of our friends impact more than we might anticipate. When we started our projects, most of us texted our friends asking how they perceive us. Multiple accompanying statements read that many people aligned with the words that others used to describe them. I think this shows us that what we hear from those around us really impacts how we view ourselves. For example, some people said that they have a bubbly personality because many people have told them they do. If someone said to you that you’re obnoxious, you might not believe it but you’ll probably wonder if it’s true. Not only does this show how much our self-concept is determined by other people, but also shows that we don’t know ourselves deeply without thinking of our dynamics with other people. This makes me think about who we are without using other people to define us. Who are we without our friends, family, hobbies, likes or dislikes? Who are we without our possessions, which many of us used to show our identity? If you break down your identity without any of these things and think about who you really are, we are all more similar at the very core of our being than we think.

Personal identity can be shaped by many factors, and each individual might have certain factors that affect their identity more than others. However, after looking at and reading about the Identity Vessels made by my peers, I noticed several common themes. Most people’s identities were influenced by their ethnicity, with me and my peers taking deep pride in the nation(s) where our families originated. While this aspect of identity, as well as others such as physical appearance, town of birth, and name, cannot be changed, much of our identity is malleable. As people go through their lives, they experience things that change how they see themselves. This idea is expressed in the poem “Fear” by Khalil Gibran, which details how a river “looks back at the path she has traveled, / from the peaks of the mountains, / the long winding road crossing forests and villages” (Gibran 3-5). The river is about to go into an ocean, and it looks at all the places it has been that has shaped its life, and knows there's no way to return, to change those past experiences. With people, past experiences make up a large part of our identities. Some students shared in their vessels that they started playing certain sports as young children, and now perhaps that sport has defined who their friends are in high school. While this decision from a decade ago still influences their lives, it does not mean that their identity cannot be changed. These students still have many decisions in their lives, whether it be where to go to college, what to do for a career, or where to settle down, and these decisions will continue to shape their identities for their entire lives.

Tracing the corners of the Seevak room, and seeing the colorful displays of boxes, booklets, paintings, and more, I had never expected to grow so fond of the projects in front of me. The truth is, I don’t know everyone that takes Facing. I don’t even think I know everyone in my class. But it was beautiful to see how in some form, some way, our identities all became one in that room. I am usually a skeptic, but today showed me that even if we feel now that our identities are finite and can’t be changed, we have always been constantly changing without even knowing. Looking at the baby photos of my classmates, and reading the stories that accompany them, I realized that not everyone knows themselves in the way they think they do. The outside perceptions were filled to the brim with “smart”, “shy”, “funny”, and more simple words, -- probably reiterated by their friends -- but the insides mainly had photos or songs that everyone liked. Not to say that these things do not matter and cannot form an identity, but I found myself wondering more about the complex adjectives people would use to describe themselves, had there been no filter.

Claude McKay explained it best in his poem “I Know My Soul”. Namely, one of the stanzas that stuck with me was:

"And if the sign may not be fully read,

If I can comprehend but not control,

I need not gloom my days with futile dread,

Because I see a part and not the whole."

I found that many people didn’t explain their identities further not because they didn’t know what to say, but rather because they may not have wanted to dig in to their personal identities in that way. We are conditioned to be proud of the things that society thinks are good attributes, and shun the ones that they don’t. This inadvertently splits us from our true identities, and it becomes our job to want to do something about it or succumb to the expectations placed upon us. We as teens may be young, but it is bittersweet to realize how much we don’t know or wont accept about ourselves. It calls for change, but also reserves some of the best parts of our beings. Nevertheless, I feel as though I understand the people around me, the spaces they make up, and the decisions they make a whole lot more now that I have essentially “seen” into their brains, and I applaud everyone for the bravery to do so. Overly-personal or not, opening up to not only so many students but in a school where it isn’t usually appreciated over academic achievement, is never an easy task.

When looking at everyone’s vessels they were extremely different even if they started from the same object. I learned many things about my peers’ identities that I did not necessarily know. I realized that it was not just me who seemed to have a hard time thinking of how others see me. On the outside, there were very few words or objects and when they were there they had a broad meaning when explained. It was very interesting to see different things that mattered or did not matter to people. The general all around was obviously friends and family which most had on their boxes. Society makes it seem like you have to pick one identity to stick with your entire life. As you grow and move to new environments your identity is going to differ. I feel it is a common misconception that you have to stay the same person your whole life. Society tends to have a category for everyone to fit into based on their identity and background which could be horrible or amazing. Many will spend most of their life trying to keep up with the current trends and trying to prove they are good enough. That entire process is draining and unhealthy for one to be fixated on. I try to catch myself more to be who I was meant to be along with being proud. I was inspired by how intimate some of the vessels were. One in particular was extremely personal and I very much admire that person for their confidence and acceptance of who they are.

Many people during the identity vessel project had one of two interpretations of how other people viewed themselves vs how they viewed themselves. One group imagined that other people viewed them extremely negatively. I saw many people, for example, one person had a vessel that was zoo based. On the outside of their vessel contained ideas that the person was overly focused on school and work and painted the picture that the person had nothing interesting going on for them. Some other vessels like the split open mannequin vessel had the outside littered with negative personality traits, such as being quiet or shy. The people of this group tended to have the inside of their vessel be full of either positive traits about themselves or items that were more personal and built into their character more. The second group had a completely different view of the project where the outside of their vessel was mainly surface level ideas on themselves like ethnicity, their name, their school, their sexuality, and things that tied to their basic identity. On the inside of the vessels of this group contained much more personal belongings and ideas. One vessel had a sock inside representing how they couldn't sleep at night without socks. These vessels lacked the negativity of how the first group thought people saw them and instead, inside their vessels revealed the details of who they were as a person. Both these groups had an overarching theme however, they believed that people on the outside didn’t truly understand them and that they viewed themselves in a much more complex vision than what outsiders would. This shares the idea that Beverly Daniel Tatum expressed in their writing of “The Complexity of Identity: Who Am I?” In the reading, Tantum describes how social identity is not clear cut and that it is impossible to see one's social identity from one glance. They describe how every aspect of a person builds upon another, and like a mirror, these traits bounce and reflect one another, hence the idea of a multidimensional nature of social identity. Many vessels thought that outsiders never understood them truly or the whole picture, and this reading builds upon that by expressing how, without seeing someone’s life in full picture, you can never truly understand a person completely on a deeper level. Aside from the vessels that reflected this idea, there was one outlier. One project being a paper pamphlet as a vessel contained all sorts of ideas on the outside but many were not negative or surface level ideas. On the inside however, the vessel was filled with self-doubt, insecurities, negative views, and self-hatred. Compared to the other vessels this one really stood out and had surprised me. It directly goes against what we learned in class, the idea that people seek out reassurance, and wish to reinforce that they are good people. Due to the negativity, this person might have a low self-esteem and leading to less dissonance.

I learned a lot about my classmates and even people I have never seen before. I was very surprised by many of the vessels, as I have seen some of these people but have never talked to them and I honestly had my own perceptions of them as a person. Some people who had seemed very extroverted or popular to me actually saw themselves differently and they all had very unique interests. I realized that many people felt that others viewed them negatively, but in their accompanying statement, it was evident that they were all just their own people who live differently, and enjoy different things. In the text “How Social Media Shapes Our Identity”, the author explained that many teenagers and even children spend hours on social media now and that can have important impacts on our identities. I agree with this, social media allows people to put themselves out there in any way they want and that can often mean just posting things that are popular and hiding the unique or “weird” things about themselves. This can really negatively affect the people who see that media, as it can often make them feel like less, because they start to think their lives aren't as good as others and this can change a lot about their identity. However, I can see a universal sense of belonging in at least some part of a community just like we learned in class, whether it be religion, a sport, their work, their passions, etc. I noticed that on the outside of many vessels, the things that defined them were more group oriented while on the inside, it was more individual and personal things.

The human identity as a concept is a series of conflicts and a series of solutions. Full of contradictions, it is a fickle, steady thing, an immovable, ambiguous thing. As is human nature, we wish to rationalize and label what we don’t understand. As is human nature, we try to restrict what cannot be restricted.

Thanks to millennia of genetic programming and evolution, humans are bound by the pack mentality—the need to belong. As is such, we tend to sacrifice parts of ourselves to feel a sense of belonging and safety. There is no better case study for this phenomenon than high school. When our unique identities come into contact with the identity hellscape that is adolescence, our “awkward middle school phase” is very quickly bullied out of us, either through actual ridicule, silent judgment, or the jarring realization that being different isn’t necessarily good. As I viewed the Identity Vessels of my classmates, I noticed one belonging to a boy I had previously written off as one of those people in the “copy-paste” friend groups, where the similarities between the members used to make it hard for me to remember which one was which. As I read his statement, however, he spoke of his experience being ridiculed all throughout elementary school as the “loud, annoying, chubby kid”, to a point where, when given the opportunity to reintroduce himself at a new school, he changed almost every aspect of his identity: he changed what he wore and hid what he liked so that he would fit in with his new classmates. He told his story of temporarily losing himself to his brand new identity, but now slowly finding ways to revisit the niche interests and familial values he previously neglected.

As I was looking through others’ vessels, I found that identity is definitely malleable and shaped by our environment and the people we want to group ourselves with in a way, but our core beliefs can’t be changed as much. For example, in terms of how you’re perceived, you might be racially perceived differently outside of the US than inside. You might dress alternatively and have that be more normal in Boston, but if you went to Texas, people would think you’re weird. In Claude McKay’s poem I Know My Soul, she writes, “If I can comprehend but not control, I need not gloom my days with futile dread,” which I interpret as her saying that she cannot control how others perceive her, and letting go of caring about that brings her more happiness. I think that process is an incredibly important part of growing up, because at the end of the day, you’ll never find fulfillment in pretending to be somebody you aren’t.

In a lot of ways, society inhibits our ability to grow and change, but it can also help us grow. In my experience, I know as I have met more people from different backgrounds and with different experiences, I feel as though I’ve grown a lot and become a better person. On the other hand, I remember seeing somebody’s statement that they had changed their identity to try and fit in at BLS, by ignoring the part of them that loved to read and Star Wars because they didn’t want to seem like a loser. I think the need to fit in with society definitely hinders your ability to grow, but getting out into different social groups helps you grow.

Some of the vessels definitely surprised me because people got really vulnerable in ways that I didn’t expect. This assignment definitely reminded me that everybody holds so much depth and is so unique, and it’s important to not box people in mentally.

Somebody else shaped their vessel as a tree to symbolize how we never stop growing. I definitely believe this to be true, and in my experience, I’ve grown a lot and considered myself differently especially in the last couple years. I also noticed that a lot of people put pictures of themselves as children. That definitely shows that although you change a lot, there’s some part of you that has stayed from your earlier years, part that you can’t get rid of even if you want to. Identity is malleable in some ways, because the things you like/dislike, the people you surround yourself with, your ideas, and your values will change over time, but other parts of you like culture, nationality, and the way you were raised will always stay with you.

Identity is shaped by many of our own personal experiences and personal cultures. Our own self-perception, or how we view ourselves, and how we view others are linked. While viewing and reading classmates' identity vessels, I noticed that our external identities are often the aspects that stand out or are highlighted by others. Across many boxes the external identities were less full then the internal. Often times it is easier to express our internal identities because we have our own thoughts, feelings, and intentions, which gives us a perceived identity. The internal perspective allows us to express what we enjoy and shows the experiences which have shaped us. On the other hand, how others perceive us is based on others and their observations, which might not always align with our self-perception. External perceptions can be filtered by biases and interpretations, making them less clear to the self. Furthermore, for those who tend to view themselves in a more favorable light, it blinds us from how others might see us because we focus on positive traits and rationalize our negative behavior with cognitive dissonance. Our internal identity and self perception is also weighed heavily on our values.

Our personal identity is malleable and it can also be influenced by societal norms. Social norms and expectations can limit our ability to express our identities freely. For instance, societal prejudices and stereotypes impose roles which make it challenging for individuals to grow away from pressures. Furthermore, we may be reluctant to challenge or change identities due to fear of rejection or discrimination. Beverly Daniel Tatum writes on internal Identity in “The Complexity of Identity: ‘Who Am I?’, stating, “Common across these examples is that in the areas where a person is a member of the dominant or advantaged social group, the category is usually not mentioned. That element of their identity is so taken for granted by them that it goes without comment. It is taken for granted by them because it is taken for granted by the dominant culture”.