Cultural Identity as a Concept: A Theoretical Survey

Identity is no longer considered a linear concept. An individual’s identity is in a continuous process of being constructed, deconstructed, and reconstructed—whether partially or totally. This process is multilayered, holding history, politics, race, and gender within its folds. As the term “identity crisis” might seem overused or a kind of cliché, the question of identity is still—and seems to still go—under investigation. As one of the most important, if not the most important, and influential thinkers of cultural identity, Stuart Hall believes that identity as a concept is no longer an essentialist one, but “this concept of identity does not [any longer] signal that stable core of the self, unfolding from beginning to end through all the vicissitudes of history without change; the bit of the self which remains always-already ‘the same’, identical to itself across time” (3). Accordingly, identity is no longer the solid or stable part of the self that stays unchangeable; on the contrary, identity is an ever-evolving being as long as the individual interacts with different social, political and historical positions.
This theoretical survey is part of a study that aims to explore the modern individual’s polyphonic nature and how he/she can embrace the different voices within him/herself in the process of constructing-deconstructing-reconstructing his/her identity.