learntoquestion ltq discussions

Identity is malleable. Who you are and how you perceive yourself can change based on your environment, your mental health, and the people you surround yourself with. When someone constantly puts themselves in places they feel belittled, or worthless, such as a home situation or a school, that will limit their self worth and identity. Another thing that affects identity is change. If changes are made in one's life, this can affect who they are and vice versa.

From the identity vessels, I was surprised at how differently I saw people before versus after. They really changed my perspective on some people, not just from their background, but how artistic and dedicated they were to their projects, and what they enjoyed. I did not know the history behind some of these people, and I could definitely see them breaking the stereotypes I had placed in my head. I have learned that people are not just what meets the eye. Within the concept of what we have learned in class, there are many cases in which self pride differentiates. For instance, someone with a high self esteem would have a vessel with both good and high adjectives or objects to describe them because they believe people see them as such. However, and in many of the identity vessels I have seen, many people described themselves negatively on the outside of their vessel, because that's how they believe they are perceived.

However, identity is based on a number of different things. How we were raised, how we see ourselves, and our environment all impacts our actions. Our individual identities impact our personal choices by our own morals and beliefs. For instance, if one has strong morals, they will live by them. However, something that can impact personal choices is what society as a whole is doing, which can greatly corrupt personal beliefs. This is called conformity.

When it comes to social conformity, many people risk their identities and who they are in order to reduce the feeling of loneliness. Kahlil Gibran describes it as a river, saying “The river needs to take the risk of entering the ocean because only then will fear disappear, because that's where the river will know it's not about disappearing into the ocean, but of becoming the ocean.” Loneliness comes with the idea of feeling different from other people, but being different is often the only thing that makes us unique. The idea of the river flowing into the ocean, the water from that river is gone, changing one entirely into the other. Identity is extremely important to society as we know it. If every river turned into an ocean, there would be no differences, no uniqueness, and everyone would be clones of another. This would get rid of different jobs, creativity, cultures, and any diversity that we have now would be gone. Identity is anything and everything, and it makes the world what it is.

I believe those who we surround ourselves with determine how others see us and how we see others. I believe given on one's surroundings we tend to try to fit in the ‘norm’ at least of those of our peers putting this external pressure to be a certain type of person resulting in criticizing ourselves. Adding on to this, like seen in the us vs them lesson, our surroundings / ingroup causes us to be initially more skeptical of those who we deem not like us. I think our personal and social identities are similar given that we try to demonstrate our morals and the general “gist” of who we are in a social setting. However it is different because in order to not be treated differently I think we don't display everything about ourselves for our social identity. This is because we fear what others may think bad of us but we want to be deemed “as exceptional or ‘other’ in their eyes.” ( Tatum ,2) in order to be seen as an us vs them. This results in keeping the things we might believe are different from the majority to ourselves.

I think viewing the vessels from my peers was an eye opening experience. The reason that I say that is because I think I had originally made subconscious assumptions about people without even realizing. I learned about people's passion for music that they don't share with others because they are self conscious about it. I learned that there are some who struggle coming from two different backgrounds. I had also learned about how people view themselves as shy but how others perceive them according to the box is by being outgoing. I think every vessel was meaningful in there own way as I was surprised at the great contrast between how people view themselves and how others view them. I think the vessels I was most surprised by were the ones created by my friends because there were many things that I learned after reading about the vessel that I had never known before. I think similar to what we had learned in class about Henri Tajfel's social identity theory about ingroup bias, I think we subconsciously determined how people are without actually knowing them and I think that this assignment displays that.

In the beginning of the creation process of my identity vessel, I didn’t have a good idea of how others see me, or how I even see myself. At first, all the ideas that came to mind were a mixed bag of positive and negative attributes. I listed many positive qualities for how I see myself, but on the other hand, I had mostly neutral and negative beliefs about how I think most people perceive me. Brainstorming my views on myself led me to the conclusion that insecurity and self-doubt shape how we see ourselves and how we believe others see us. It is a common tendency for humans to fixate on their flaws, whether that be based on their appearance or academic performance. When we become preoccupied with our flaws for too long, we tend to exaggerate how serious they are and delude ourselves with the idea that other people take notice as well. What also contributes to how we view ourselves and others is social media. While commenting upon the nature of social media, Nausicaa Renner states, “New technology—especially the smartphone—allows us to produce a narrative of our lives…” (Renner, 2). When we see a produced narrative of someone’s life on social media, we have the tendency to compare, which only leads to envy and weakness in our self-image. Additionally, I believe that our identity truly is malleable and is changing every day. During childhood, our minds are so receptive and absorb everything around us, as we are still navigating and adjusting to the new world. I believe this still holds true to a certain extent throughout our lives, as our identity is constantly being built upon when we continue to learn and improve and become introduced to new ideas, people, and environments. Lastly, walking around the Seevak room and being able to interact with everyone’s identity vessel was truly insightful. Just by walking around the room, I was able to get a glimpse into the lives of so many people who I’ve never even met. I learned that a lot of people are in touch with both their nationality and ethnicity, along with being BLS students. I also noticed that many identity vessels included photos of loved ones from childhood, demonstrating how defining childhood and the people we grow up with are to our identity.

I feel like the main thing that shapes how others see us is the outside, regardless of any positive first impressions that have been made. Just like in job interviews for certain places, you may meet all of the qualifications of being a stellar employee, but you have a visible tattoo. The outside is how people perceive us and what they are constantly judging us by. The outside for many people often shapes how they see themselves whenever they are lacking the newest current trend with the coolest shoes or the coolest brand. Arguably the biggest social choice people make is whether or not they want to be present on social media. Nausica Renner said, “...such media can prevent those who wish to break with their past from doing so cleanly. We’re not the only ones posting; our friends and family chronicle our lives, usually without our consent.” This quote gives us a glimpse into the negative side effects of social media and the constant worry about having a clean digital footprint. Apps like Instagram often cultivate a jealous environment because people will constantly compare themselves to others. Comparison is the thief of joy, and unfortunately those comparisons can lead to people developing low self-esteem. I learned a lot from my peers' identity vessels because more so than what was on the inside, it was interesting to see how they assumed people saw them when my own beliefs about them were contradictory. These vessels do a great job of relating to the concept of identity because it shows both sides of the story instead of just the side that you want to believe about a specific person, especially if they are not in your “in” group. Not only did this whole project have the possibility of contradicting your opinion of someone, it also had a high potential for self reflection.

I think the way that we see the identities of ourselves and others is shaped by our beliefs, teachings, and morals. In the identity vessel project, many people’s projects included their religion, favorite hobbies, and their interests. As a result of these factors, we usually form a social group with others who share these interests. Engaging with our social groups have shifted our ways of thinking about ourselves as well as others. Our identity is also malleable and not set in stone as introducing new ways of thinking, or being exposed to new ways of thinking can shift our beliefs and either become more open to them or more closed to them. In the reading, “The Complexity of Identity: “Who Am I?” by Beverly Daniel Tatum, something that really stuck out to me was how she started it. She asked the reader questions about how they identify but then had questions about how other parties viewed us. I think that the views of others greatly influence the views that we have on ourselves. If we don’t fit in with the majority group, we will probably want to change ourselves to become “ideal”. In some projects that I read, some students felt this way and they said that they changed themselves to fit in while keeping their original identity hidden. I learned a lot about my classmates’ personal lives and it shocked me that it was the complete opposite of how some of them seemed to be in school. Many people’s social identities vary greatly from their personal identities and this project really helped me see the differences between everyone. We all have our own interests, hobbies, favorite foods, and extracurriculars that we don’t get to show off to others. This project was an eye opening experience and taught me not to make quick judgements about others because we are all unique.

When walking around the room, I learned that many of my peers believe that they are perceived in negative ways by their classmates. This made me realize that this feeling was common, and it is something that I experience, and it was sort of comforting to realize that others were going through this as well. I think that people believe that they are perceived negatively because in society (especially high school), our ability to change and grow is somewhat limited due to the fact that many people are unwilling to change their view of other people. For example, many people still judge others by their actions in sixie year or eighth grade, which can make it difficult to grow as a person when you believe that others still view you in a certain way. This is especially true in the age of social media. Because so much has been posted of one’s past self, and the fact that these posts are still visible, it can be hard to develop when you feel constantly reminded of the person you used to be. The text by Nausicaa Renner states, “such media can prevent those who wish to break with their past from doing so cleanly”. The text gives an example of a person named Kevin, who said “I just have to live with him and all those people he was trying to escape”, because of the fact that people were still tagging him in his social media account from high school, even though he graduated years ago. I do not have any social media, so when writing this I felt grateful that I do not have to deal with it, but I do know that some of my friends struggle from trying to separate themselves from the person they used to be due to the fact that there is a lot of online content posted by their younger selves.

When walking around I had learned facts about people I didn’t know before, many star wars items and baseball memorabilia. There are also factors of how you view your culture and your economic status that others can’t see. It got me thinking about how, sometimes, my perception of other people is completely different than how they view themselves. The main idea of the Identity Vessel Project is to learn about others but to see their personality on full display whether that be their major personality traits or their subtle ones. I was especially surprised by a few in which I had learned new facts about people I thought I knew when I guess I didn’t, to me this proves that identity is complex and isn’t as static as we sometimes make it out to be. The project made people ask themselves “Who am I?” (Tatum), this allows people to actually reflect on themselves. If you were to define yourself just based on how everyone else sees you you wouldn’t be able to say who you really are. Identity is a very complex concept in which people have a hard time figuring out. It may be hard for some to find who they really are as they attempt to fit in with other groups. This leads to a disconnect between them and who they really are. This project forced us to get rid of any idea comfort and really dive into how we view yourself and how others view us. The main takeaway of the project is that people have different thoughts and views of others and once we see how they view themselves we can really get to know them. Instead of making them a one sided person with just thoughts and assumptions they are a multi layered person with thoughts and beliefs many don’t see.

Looking around the room, a common thing I saw was that many people put their racial identity on the outside of their boxes. This is a part of our identity we can never change, and we are only born with. Living in Boston, and going to such a diverse high school, I was not surprised to see the different flags pasted on everyone’s boxes. However, I do think that race is one of the biggest parts of our identity that lead to assumptions. In my own experience, I’ve often been mistaken for being Latina, just based on the color of my skin. In some of the vessels, I saw that people put an assumed nationality on the outside, and their true nationality on the inside. This is certainly connected to a bigger concept of identity, race. Race has ties to everyone’s identity. For me, my race is tied with my identity as a daughter, a granddaughter and an older sister. To others, it might lead to assumptions of intelligence, customs, or even citizenship. These vessels are a real testament to how much race is wrapped into our identities, and leads to questions around how race impacts the identities of societies.

It was also really interesting to see the difference in how people associated with their identities in terms of other people. Some of my classmates are very big family people, and that was shown by their pictures of family both on the inside and outside of their vessels. Some people are very social, and paste pictures of their friends on or in their vessels, as I did. However, some people do not associate their identity with other people at all, and instead feel that they are more represented by the things they like, or the things they do. I also thought it was really interesting to see if people put pictures of their friends and family on the inside or the outside of their box. For me, for example, I put a picture of me and my friends on the outside because I feel that is how people know me. My friends and social life are a big part of my identity, and I feel that they are tied with my personal identity and my outside perception. For others, they may appear pretty shy at school, and their social life is something that they keep inside, to themselves. This concept impacts our personal and social choices because, often we make decisions based on what others think of us. Feeling like your decision impacts your friends, may make you decide differently. Moreover the pressure to appear as a certain type of person, socially or not, impacts the choices we make in shaping our identities. This idea is seen on a bigger level as well. Global leaders, government officials, religious icons, and even celebrities and social media influencers shape their personal identites around how they want, or even need to be, perceived. Once people with influence like that connect their personal identity with their social identity, I think it can become hard to differentiate between who one is, and who one wants/needs to be.

This leads into the idea that our identity is malleable. I believe we are not born with personality, opinions, or status. Certainly, there are parts of our identity that we can not change, like race, gender, sexuality, family history, etc. But the things we are born into, shape our identity, like class, location, mentality. On the contrary, however, I think society today has completely changed our identities. It is acceptable today to change our gender or sexuality (and it should be), or to move out of our family, work our way out of our given class. But more specifically, I think society today has made it possible to completely write our own identities. With social media, we can be influenced so heavily, we feel we must change parts of ourselves. Or, we can project an identity we want to be so much, everyone assumes that that is how you are. I think this is something extremely relevant in the past decade. Contradicting my thoughts again, I think society has also made it really hard to change our social identities. In high school, for example, it is so common amongst everyone, that once we’ve picked our group, or chosen our friends, our identities are automatically ‘assigned’ to us. Here is where I think it's important that everyone has an inner monolouge or thought. Because in order to know who you are, I think you have to ignore the identities placed upon you, or that youve broadcasted to the world, and look inside at your behavior, tendencies, beliefs, etc, to know who your identity is.

Our understanding of who we are, at least in part (the degree of which varies on self-esteem), is influenced by our beliefs of how others perceive us. Even individuals confident in themselves, when met with perceptions differing from their personal identity by an overwhelming majority, would begin to experience seeds of self-doubt. The response to which may either become a self-fulfilling prophecy of conscious or unconscious internalization of others perceptions, or lead to what Beverly Daniel Tatum, in her work “The Complexity of Identity: ‘Who Am I?’”, calls “non-learning” – essentially vehement rejection and standing up for personal identity.

How we are viewed by others on the surface, as well as how we view others is reliant on our eyes and ears. Race, expression through fashion, and rumors form the initial perception. However, we constantly shape how we present ourselves to the world, which is interestingly intertwined with perception. How we appear to others impacts how we see ourselves, but how we see ourselves changes how we express ourselves, which changes how others see us. Our genetics and environment set an innate part of our individual identity, but the difference to our social identity is how these aspects are incorporated into our thoughts and personality – in other words, social identity refers largely to aspects of our identity derived from group membership. Beyond just membership, however, a key part to understanding the difference between our personal and social identity for ourselves, is behavior in that social context. The stories we tell ourselves about who we are are critical to our personal identity, our degree of goodness as well as values and beliefs. Yet normative conformity and justification of cognitive dissonance may differentiate the social identity from the personal standard, and perhaps question the truth of those stories. Thus, personal identity is complex. The moral and cognitive aspects require critical reflection of what we align with, and are malleable as we gain knowledge from our experiences. The physical endeavors and interests that shape parts of us may be limited in malleability by socioeconomic class. Overall, identity is a dynamic reflection of our self perception.

In the context of this project, it is easy to think that those who are confident, outgoing and appear unabashedly themselves present their personal identity to the world. It was humbling to see the identity vessels in that sense, the degree of contrast that still existed. It was a reminder to an earlier Venn diagram of Carl Rogers’ Theory of Personality and Congruence, where even though the diagram was labeled as congruent with the ability to self actualize, the overlap between self-image and ideal self was not so significant in size as I had assumed it should be. I found that many identity vessels on the inside incorporated their cultural identity as shaping who they were – though this was less true for U.S. Americans, consistent with another of Tatum’s observations that individuals in a dominant or advantaged social group do not usually mention this category of themselves. Quite a few people also showed passions I would never have guessed for them. Admittedly, I was surprised with the degree of vulnerability people were willing to show.

Other people’s opinions really shape how we see ourselves and how we see others. Today’s society is heavily influenced by what we see on social media. There are many times where I would say that I want a celebrities life because they are rich but I don’t know how they actually live. I also find myself doing that to my friends and family. I find myself wishing that I had their lives because they seem so put together but seeing their vessels make me realize that they are a lot more different than I thought they were. A lot of them did extracurricular activities that I would never even think about doing. In some of the papers I read, people spoke about how the views of themselves were often based on what other people thought of them. We are mostly influenced by what our parents and friends think of us because we want both our parents approval and to not feel like a sore thumb with our friends. We change our thinking and mindset to fit in with those around us. We more often than not surround ourselves with people that have the same way of thinking as we do while treating us right and supporting us. Our personal identities are sometimes oppressed when we mingle with others. I find myself holding on onto a lot of opinions of mine because I either don’t want to be “cancelled” or don’t want to be made fun of by those around me. My personal and social identities are quite different and I think most people’s are different too because we don’t always agree with our social groups and their norms. I think personal and social identities are always different.