The aims of this lecture:
- To introduce historical conceptions of identity
- To introduce Foucault's 'discourse' methodology
- To place and critique contemporary practice within these frameworks, and to consider their validity
- To consider 'postmodern' theories of identity as 'fluid' and 'constructed', in particular Zygmunt Bauman
- To consider identity today, especially in the digital domain
There are many different theories of identity.
- Essentialism - This is the traditional approach. This talks about how our biological make-up makes us who we are; we all have an inner essence that makes us who we are.
- Post-Modern theorists disagree with this and are anti-essentialist.
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We all have an inner essence that
makes us who we are.
Physiognomy and Phrenology
Phrenology: This is considered to be a 'quack science', as there is very little substance behind the theory.
The basic idea behind this concept relates to the size of certain parts of the brain and depending on which parts of the brain are the wrong size depends on what it indicates. For example, if the section of the brain responsible for our animal urges was too large, in accordance to phrenology this would mean that we would have criminalistic urges. This stems from a book written by Friedrich Nietzsche entitled 'Superman' which talks about the 'aryan race', something that is famously linked to Adolf Hitler.
Physiognomy: This effectively legitimises racism. It does so through various different methods as shown below.
This image shows two men, both having very exaggerated features, and talks about the way in which criminal tendencies are inherited.
This is a diagram showing another way in which physiognomy can be used to determine the intelligence of someone. To do so, they draw a straight line from their eyebrow down to their upper lip; the more vertical the line, the more intelligent. This diagram shows a white man, very 'aryan race' in appearance being the most intelligent, whilst at the other end of the spectrum is a black man.
Supremacy of Anglo-Teutonic (Harpers weekly) suggesting superiority of white westerns.
Hieronymous Bosch, facial features highly exaggerated to show animalistic tendencies of the Jewish, racist
This is the 'Holy Virgin Mary', painted by Chris Ofili in 1996, which caused a huge fuss everywhere it was displayed. In it, he suggests that the Holy Virgin Mary was something other than a beautiful, white European woman, as she is portrayed in every other painting.
Historical phases of identity
- Pre-Modern Identity - Personal identity is stable and defined by long standing roles.
‘Secure’ identities
Farm-worker ………. landed gentry
The Soldier ……. The state
The Factory Worker… Industrial capitalism
The Housewife…… patriarchy
The Gentleman…. patriarchy
Husband-Wife (family)….. Marriage/church
- Modern Identity - Modern societies begin to offer a wider range of social roles. Possibility to start 'choosing' your identity as opposed to being born into it. At this point, people start to worry about who they are and how they are being perceived.
This occurred during the 19th and early 20th centuries, and has been discussed in many books. Some of the main ones are:
- Charles Baudelaire - The Painter of Modern Life, 1863
- Thorstein Veblen - Theory of the Leisure Class, 1899
- Georg Simmel - The Metropolis and Mental Life, 1903
Charles Baudelaire was the first to introduce the concept of the 'flaneur' which translates to the 'gentleman-stroller'; their role is to go out and see whilst importantly being seen. This is a masculine term and talks about the gentleman that has time to stroll around in his best clothes; this idea showing signs of a patriarchal society in which men are in charge. Thorstein Veblen then spoke about 'conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure'. Conspicuous consumption is the act of purchasing goods in order to show off your superiority and wealth. Examples of this captured in art:
These paintings by Gustave Caillebotte show this idea of the 'flaneur', outside walking around in order to see and be seen. This happened around the same time as 'Haussmannisation' which involved the redesigning of the city streets as an attempt to separate the lower classes from the upper class.
Georg Simmel came up with the 'trickle down theory', which is essentially a cycle of emulation and distinction. The lower classes try to emulate and portray themselves as being of a higher class, which then cause the higher class to buy something new in order to distinguish themselves. Georg Simmel also said 'The feeling of isolation is rarely as decisive and intense when one actually finds oneself physically alone, as when one is a stranger without relations, among many physically close persons, at a party, on the train, or in the traffic of a large city.' A good example of what Simmel is talking about is this painting, by Edvard Munch:
Simmel suggests that; because of the speed of mutability of modernity, individuals withdraw into themselves to find peace. He describes this as 'the sensation of the subjective from the objective life' This painting clearly shows this, a crowd of people all seemingly separated from one another.
Michael Foucault was one of the main writers that discussed this idea
- Post-Modern Identity - Accepts a 'fragmented self' and identity is constructed.
The phrase 'discourse analysis' is often used when talking about post-modern identity. Identity is constructed out of the discourses culturally available to us. A discourse was described as 'a set of recurring statements that define a particular cultural 'object' and provide concepts and terms through which such an object can be studied and discussed'.
These 'discourses' could be a range of things, such as:
- Age
- Class
- Gender
- Nationality
- Race/Ethnicity
- Sexual Orientation
- Education
- Income
The main ones that we will be looking at are often referred to as 'the others'. History has mainly been written by white, middle class, European men and everyone else has been pushed out. We will be looking at:
- Class
- Nationality
- Race/Ethnicity
- Gender and Sexuality
Class
Many people have looked into the idea of social status and class. One of these is photographer Humphrey Spender, who created the project 'Worktown' in 1937:
Although this image looks almost comical, it is in fact the opposite. The seemingly welcoming hand being raised was actually an attempt, along with aggressive words, to get the photographer to leave. This was the kind of welcoming that the upper class photographers received frequently.
In order to understand what class you are, you must first understand the differences between each of the class and be able to distinguish which is which. This project was an attempt to document and understand the lower classes living in Bolton at the time that photographs were taken. A modern photographer that has explored similar themes within their own work is Martin Parr. Here are some of his images:
These seem to make similar comments about the class system and the way in which lower class people behave. 'Society reminds one of a particularly shrewd, cunning and pokerfaced player in the game of life, cheating if given a chance, flouting rules whenever possible'.
Nationality
Martin Parr also looks at the idea of Nationality and the way in which stereotypes are used in order to portray different people.
These ideas, however, have also been explored through other forms of visual culture as well as photography. Fashion designer Alexander McQueen and his 'Highland Rape' collection is a very good example of this.
The use of the word rape, no matter what the context, is always very evoking especially for women. 'Much of the press coverage centred around accusations of misogyny because of the imagery of semi-naked, staggering and brutalised women, in conjunction with the word 'rape' in the title. But McQueen claimed that the rape was of Scotland, not the individual models, as the theme of the show was the Jacobite rebellion.'
Race and Ethnicity
One of the most important black artists, probably the first main black artist in England, Chris Ofili looks at the idea of perception and the way in which black people are represented within artwork.
The image on the left was a piece made shortly after a race crime in which he used imagery of the victim within the woman's tears. It is titled 'No Woman, No Cry' referring to the Bob Marley song and, typical within his work, elephant dung is used as a stand for the piece; both of these being strong representations of black culture.
The image on the right is called 'Captain Shit and the Legend of the Black Stars' and was a super hero that Ofili himself invented. He was interested in comic books but when he examined them closer, looking specifically at the super heroes, he soon realised there were no real black super heroes. Once again, the use of elephant dung helped to criticise the way in which black people are often stereotyped and portrayed.
A photographer who looked at the way in which black people were portrayed and perceived was Gillian Wearing, who won the Turner Prize for her project named 'Signs that say what you want them to say and not signs that say what someone else wants you to say' in 1992/3.
Gender and Sexuality
'Edmund Bergler, an American psychoanalyst writing in the 1950's, went much further, both in condemning the ugliness of fashion and in relating it to sex. He recognised that the fashion is the work not of women, but of men. Its monstrosities, he argued, were a 'gigantic unconscious hoax' perpetrated on women by the arch villains of the Cold War - male homosexuals (for he made the vulgar assumption that all dress designers are 'queers'). Having first, in the 1920's, tried to turn women into boys, they had latterly expressed their secret hatred of women by forcing them into exaggerated, ridiculous, hideous clothes'.
Postmodern Theory
- Identity is constructed through our social experience
- Erving Goffman - The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, 1959. Goffman saw life as 'theatre', made up of encounters and performances. For Goffman, the self is a series of facades.
Another key writer of postmodern identity theories is Zygmunt Bauman, his main books are:
- Identity, 2004
- Liquid Modernity, 2000
- Liquid Love, 2003
Bauman said 'Yes, indeed, 'identity' is revealed to us only as something to be invented rather than discovered; as a target of an effort, 'an objective''.
Andy Hargreaves also made a comment on postmodern identity, and said 'In airports and other public spaces people with mobile-phone headset attachments walk around, talking aloud and alone, like paranoid schizophrenics, oblivious to their immediate surroundings. Introspection is a disappearing act. Faced with moments alone in their cars, on the street or at a supermarket checkouts, more and more people do not collect their thoughts, but scan their mobile phone messages for shreds of evidence that someone, somewhere may need or want them.'
Barbara Kruger took the phrase 'I think therefore I am' from the philosopher Rene Descartes, and altered it so that it was applicable to a modern audience; with the iconic piece of design named 'I shop therefore I am'.
To end the lecture, we were left with this quote from Zygmunt Bauman:
'Identity is a hopelessly ambiguous idea and a double-edged sword. It may be a war-cry of individuals, or of the communities that wish to be imagined by them. At one time the edge of identity is turned against 'collective pressures' by individuals who resent conformity and hold dear their own ways of living (which 'the group' would decry as prejudices) and their own ways of living (which 'the group' would condemn as cases of 'deviation' or 'silliness', but at any rate of abnormality, needing to be cured or punished'.
