Essay #2: Our Identities, Our Stories: Who Am I?
Topic:
The understanding self is critical to becoming a responsible member of society and our practices of equity. Becoming an equity practitioner asks us to look at ourselves on a very deep and complex level. So, let’s begin with a vital question: What’s your story?
We self-identify with several cultures in our society. Our cultural identities shape who we are. These identities also influence how we see others, influence our opinions, and dictate how we engage with other cultures within our society.
Beverly Daniel Tatum (Links to an external site.) discusses the complexity of identity in Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? (Links to an external site.) She depicts how identity is shaped by individual characteristics, family dynamics, historical factors, and social and political contexts (Tatum 99). Tatum poses the question “Who Am I?” and offers the following response: “The answer depends in large part on who the world around me says I am. Who do my parents say I am? Who do my peers say I am? What message is reflected back to me in the faces and voices of my teachers, my neighbors, store clerks. What do I learn from the media about myself? How am I represented in the cultural images around me? Or am I missing from the picture altogether?” (99).
Tatum argues that integrating one’s past, present, and future into a cohesive, unified sense of self is a complex task that begins in adolescence and continues for a lifetime (101).
The question of identity and the reshaping of self is explored in countless other works, as well. In her collection of writing, “Brown Album: Essays on Exile and Identity,” author Porochista Khakpour relates her relationship with identity as she shares, “I had tactics as a child: I hid inside the American costumes I wore – punk, cowgirl, starlet – and took on Persian only when I had to” (4). She continues, “Once in a while a baffled peer would ask: ‘But what’s Persian? Aren’t you from Iran? I’d spin the wheel in my brain and let the arrow land on the many somethings, anythings, I had cobbled…” (4).
The objective of this essay is to gain insight into how our cultural identities inform our experiences, values, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors, and to better understand the diversity and connections within society.
Identifying Individual Culture(s): Dimensions of Diversity
The primary dimensions of age, race, gender, ethnicity, (dis)abilities, sexual identity, economic class (childhood), and religion (childhood) serve as core elements and shape our basic self-image and our fundamental view. They help form our core expectations of others in our personal and professional life.
The secondary dimensions of culture including education, income/economic status, religious beliefs (current), relationship/parental status, geographic location, and work background serve as independent influences on our self-esteem and self-definition. This influence varies with who we are, our stage of life, and changes we have experienced.
In this essay, you will explore the dimensions of identity and find 5 different dimensions that highlight your cultural/life identity. You need to pick a least one from primary and one from secondary. The other three can come from either category. Please note: You may use the same dimensions and the same writing from your discussion if you like! You may also change the information if you prefer.
Your choices could be those with which you have built confident relationships, or those that you are trying to comfortably unfold. Explain your relationship with those dimensions and why they are significant. These stories will be told with a personal and subjective voice. Please only share what you comfortable doing so. These essays will only be read by me.
You must use Khakpour to highlight your argument. Begin your source integration by introducing the Khakpour writing for your readers. Like we’ve done previously, assume that your reader has not read the article/s. Give your readers the key info about the text, such as the full name of the writer, the title, and an overall summary of the text in your own words. Preview the idea/concept you want to quote by explaining it in your own words.
You must also use two additional sources that can be found through the GCC databases or other well-vetted sources. Don’t forget to add a signal phrase and parenthetical citation.
After each quote, explain what you think the quote means and how you think it reflects the argument you are making about identity and/or self. Analyze in no less than 3-5 sentences, per quote. You will likely have more analysis than that.
Please be sure to include at least one secondary piece of information (a quote from Khakpour or one of your secondary sources) to help support EACH dimension. This is important.
Your paper should include the following requirements:
Your paper should be a 1500+ word essay 1’’ side margins, 1” header and footer margins, Times New Roman, 12 pt. font. The Works Cited does not count in your word count.
This paper should include a strong working thesis to help focus your essay; this is a main complex claim or thinking question you set up early on and develop/refine/complicate as the paper unfolds. Your claims should represent complexity in thinking through your ideas and need to be supported by detailed reasons and evidence.
You should be in conversation with your chosen and assigned texts. Keep in mind that you want your sources to be credible, or you have to make them credible through your own analysis. Don’t forget about the Library Databases!
As you incorporate your sources, accurately summarize the ideas, theories, terms, or concepts you are using from that source to offer context (making sure your summary is understandable to a reader who is not familiar with the source you’re introducing). Your sources should be a springboard for your own claims, questions, and analysis. In other words, you must “do something” with your sources. Be sure to clarify the meaning of the material you have quoted, paraphrased, or summarized and explain its significance in light of your evolving thesis – this is what the citation sandwich move is all about.
Support your claims with reasoning and evidence – making sure to link the evidence to the claim(s). Don’t just tell stories. Think why? So what? What does this mean? How does this define identity? Please be sure to include at least one secondary piece of information (a quote from Khakpour or one of your secondary sources) to help support EACH dimension.
As you move toward the conclusion, address the “so what?” question for your thesis.
Clearly and explicitly explain your chain of reasoning – the thought connections you are making throughout your draft between claims, evidence, & sources. The more clearly you explain connections to your readers, the more your readers will be able to follow your thinking.
Cite all sources in MLA format (in text), in addition to a Works Cited page.
