For the past twenty-three years, the meaning of my identity has eluded me. As a Pakistani-born girl brought up in Germany by an American Army community, I constantly questioned myself: am I more Pakistani or American? Can I preserve an Eastern culture in a Western world? And most importantly, why must I explicitly define my identity at all? In the face of growing irresolution, it became apparent that “my” identity was not the problem but the society-imposed obligation of bearing a pronounced Identity. At the beginning of civilization, Identity was one of the essential building blocks in creating successful communities of man. Prehistoric hunters and gatherers united under their common goal of survival in a harsh and unforgiving environment and, thus, found Identity attributes to bring them together. However, as the ages passed on, the static concept of Identity has torn apart mankind’s communities and created chaos in the attempt to preserve an archaic standard.

Historically, we notice a trend of societies latching on to long-standing traditions such as intolerance and prejudice based on Identity. From this one word, or the lack of its understanding, emanates an abundance of society’s ills. As a student of rhetoric, I cannot claim a capable definition of Identity. However, due to the dated constraints of Identity and the consequences of its inertia, modern-day culture craves liberation from the outdated Identity and the initiation of a restructured concept. Only with an evolved notion of the self is it possible for contemporary society to permanently eliminate the antique specters of prejudice and racism.

The term, Identity, was derived from the Latin word idem meaning “the same.” Identity began with the idea of being ‘the same’ as another or sharing a common attribute. In essence, when one has an Identity, he or she is able to identify or connect with a group, whether it is religious, cultural, or national. The larger group, that many individuals may belong to, provides an individual a sense of safety and feeling of belonging or comfort. It is natural for one to look for these feelings when choosing whom to associate with. Before the development of civilization, human survival relied upon the safety and security of men. Many of the “same” bonded together to form nomadic tribes; here, we began to see the first signs an Identity being formed. The tribe members depended on one another to gather food, build shelter and reproduce. In this environment, man was forced, in order to survive, to develop a notion of tribe and found ways of creating associations with other men.

Originally Identity, or the concept of finding commonalities with others, was a progressive and constructive effort that helped tribe development and contributed to the survival of man. However, the hidden aspect of the “safety” theory arises when one is confused as to how to react to those that are not “the same.” If others are not the same as us, do we apply a counteractive, polar approach and brand those that are not aren’t the same or different as dangerous to our safety? Is the antithesis to allying with those that are the same, to attack or flee from those whom are dissimilar?

As notions of Identity became excessively structured upon certain characteristics, such as faith, color, sex or wealth, societies urbanized in certain respects, but remained prehistoric in their treatment of those who did not adhere to the aforementioned arrangements. Some of our greatest societal disease arose from these antiquated ideals and we can find illustrations of the argument throughout history.

Traditionally, due to the physical nature of a man’s strength, women fell into silent and submissive caretaker roles. Finally in the 20th century, women were given the right to vote, opportunities to take an active role in the business environment and recognized as equal citizens of a community. Identity played a major role both in the oppression of women as well as in the acceptance of women as equal counterparts. Conventionally women were perceived as the opposite of men; therefore, if men were given, for example, voting rights, women were not as they were not deemed deserving due to their sex. But with the American suffrage movement and similar movements all over the world, women are now acknowledged by men, for their Identity as fellow human beings rather than the Identity as a female and therefore, deserving of equal rights. This simple distinction and the ability to Identify with the more common thread of humanity, instead of creating gender boundaries has contributed to the progressively equal treatment of men and women in today’s culture.

In the same light, we can see in the example of slavery how small distinctions between groups contributed in the creation of century-old struggles whose ramifications are echoed to this day. Faith and belief systems bound communities together in certain places, whereas elsewhere, these attributes or the color of one’s skin created strife. The classification methodology of man’s differences augmented the deconstructive elements of Identity. For example, in ancient India, the light skinned and richer castes of Hindu society bonded due to their common attributes and shunned the darker or poor castes labeling them as the “untouchables.” Here we find an example where color was also a pseudo-definition of wealth since the landowners or wealthy could afford to stay indoors and out of the hot sun, while the poor laborers toiled in the heat to eventually be of darker skin color. These lower castes were condemned to jobs such as cleaning latrines and picking up filth. The effects of the caste system from over 2500 thousand years ago reverberate in today’s Indian slums, where the descendents of ancient “untouchables” are locked into a life of poverty and unlikely upward class mobility.

Skin color can be considered as a major impediment of progressive cultural Identity in the Americas. The European colonies in America during the 16th and 17th centuries required able-bodied human labor in order to survive. The light skinned settlers found an easy solution to this problem by capturing and enslaving millions of Africans and Native Americans or those of dark skin. Creating Identity with those European backgrounds developed from a positive method of survival to a destructive tool to claiming superiority with those who were “not the same” or of European background. The polar approach of ‘what is not like us must not be deserving of the same rights as us’ developed into a devastating institution built upon differences and contradicted the initial positivity of Identity for survival.

The antipodal frame of thought yields our most basic and dangerous societal feelings of prejudice. From prejudice and the mismanagement of Identity stems racism, a plague purged within civilization for ages. However, it would be shortsighted to claim Identity became deconstructive simply due to the establishment of differences between people. In the 1950s, a French neo-psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, formulated a theory concerning development of Identity for a child. He suggested that the mirror phenomenon between a child and his earliest environment (i.e. parents, family, etc.) created the child’s perception of the world. In short, the attitude a child saw his parents exhibit towards him and others was adopted by the child and formulated the creation of his concept of Identity. For years, the mistakes that have been dictated to us by our adults have been repeated intentionally or unintentionally. Of course, it is natural for a child to take on attitudes that he or she grew up with but it is important to recognize the shortcomings of this theory. History or the environment of a person cannot be held liable for their actions. But it is worthy to note this theory as it does explain a common phenomenon where the Identity of one’s childhood environment is copied over to the child’s Identity and sense of self.

For years, men and women were raised to believe a part of social mores for women to tend only household duties and leave the rest of a community’s positions to men. This barrier was broken when people realized that the traditional concept of female inferiority was criminal and a new Identity of women was formulated. Similarly, for centuries, slavery was the norm in American society, but due to the recognition of darker skinned people as equal counterparts, we finally shed this disgusting tradition. The unchanging ideals of these Identities over time radiate a great deal of friction for today’s culture. Read any newspaper today and you can find articles discussing affirmative action, feminism, and other residual consequences from traditional forms of prejudice and discrimination, that may not have existed had societies been more tolerant in the past. The antipodal ideology as well as adoption of recurring themes in history illustrate why the inert state of Identity theories is destructive for the proper social evolution of our world.

To prolong ancient madness and accept it as the custom creates major disputes. We must analyze our history to reveal solutions to the dilemmas posed by the static Identity concepts. For issues of slavery and women suffrage in America, the solutions to these problems were a revolution of the Identity concepts of the time. When men realized that women were capable of being their equals in all aspects of life, they found a link of humanity, instead of the boundary of gender. Since the Emancipation Proclamation and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, the age-old ideas of black slaves and white owners are slowly disintegrating from the American culture as we realized that people of all colors are entitled to equal treatment as citizens of our modern national community.

In today’s world, people of common faiths or status find associations due to their similarities but the same ideas of discrimination or intolerance to those who do not partake in the associations are practiced. As contemporary American women and blacks are recovering from traditional attitudes of discrimination, there is a noticeable trend of discrimination to Muslim-Americans and intolerance towards foreign nationals. Although it is not unimaginable as to why these prejudices may exist, it should be unimaginable for them to continue if we are to exist as a modern free country. Despite our color, faith, wealth, gender or nationality, we should remember our far-reaching similar characteristic of being part of one human race. Identity is instrumental when we use it to develop and retain our different cultures and traditions. These aspects create the colorful fabric that is humanity but we must realize that the different fabrics are part of one all-encompassing cloth and should not be a basis to rip the cloth apart. The divisions in society only contribute to our failures as a civilization and encourage prejudice and intolerance among people.

Identity must evolve from the antipodal ideology, the adoption of traditionally dangerous ideals, as well other concepts that further segregate our cultures. Only with the evolution of Identity is it possible for us to create a peaceful environment, where the need to attack one another or isolate ourselves is no longer a viable option. Racism cannot survive in an environment where commonalities are celebrated instead of differences emphasized as reasons to divide and strike. The traditional ideals of slavery and female oppression disappearing from America endorsed the idea, that Identity barriers and their usage as a basis of domination and intolerance is corrupt. From a study of history, we witness, it is indeed, possible for us to overcome archaic Identity divisions and unify ourselves with restructured Identity affinities.