What Are The Significant Markers Of Identity And How Do They Matter?

What are the significant markers of identity and how do they matter?

There are many things that can affect our identities some were formed before our true characteristics came into play such as race, gender, sexuality and nationality. However others are shaped by our experiences such as interests both social and political, accent, personality and our choice of religion. In this essay I am going to explain and expand on points that show the affects that both our identities have on our lives and our lives have on our identities.

Firstly gender is a scientific lottery where the outcome is either male or female rather than a national gamble on a huge sum of money. Some may say that gender is just a scientific determination to create two groups of human beings in order to encourage individuality. On the other hand some may say that it is a scientific purpose in order to encourage segregation. Although now women have the vote the gap between the opportunities that men are given and the opportunities that women are given is significantly smaller. However in the workplace men are on average paid 15 per cent more than women are for doing the same job (ref. Lattenomics.wordpress.com/2008). This is not just a British employment issue nor only is it a European employment issue because even "in the United States of America men earn $4600 more than women in their first post-MBA job" (ref. American economic survey 2007). Furthermore even gender a differentiation caused by a single hormone after conception of the child can still affect you in later life.

Secondly accent is derived from those around us, and those we are brought up by influence us the most; these include both our peers and family members. Accents are usually specific to the area or country that you have lived the most, and some fall victim to a little harmless social ridicule. Different dialects can help others pin point the location of your residence or even to the background of your family members. "Scientists are baffled by the ability of the brain to adapt its traditional methods of understanding what it is used to hearing [such as a local accent] to understand stronger accents and even foreign accents...the more the brain is subjected to the unusual the more it develops" (ref. www.cofc.edu/linguist/archives). The strength of your accent often gives away the length of time you have recently spent in one area; for example if someone has a Manchester accent that has a Welsh twang to it, this can often make clear that this person is from Manchester and has recently spent time either in Wales or around people with Welsh accents.

Another marker of identity is social class, this tends to be determined by the amount of income that your parents receive which generally correlates to match a higher state of employment such as a highly skilled job or professional employment (lawyer, doctor etc.) "The disparity between the rich and poor has been steadily growing for the past 30 years, creating social stratification...this has led many to question the role of social class in the development of children." (ref. Annette Lareau, Ph.D. Berkley Center for Working families) However there is another factor that can affect a person's social class which is the level and standard of education that they receive such as a person educated in a private institution is generally classed as middle class or higher; this is due to the amount of money it costs to send a child to a private school. This point brings me onto explain another factor which affects a person's identity; Education.

Your identity is largely formed through your experiences and situations that you are placed in throughout your life. Your identity changes mostly between the ages of 7 and 18, where you go through different phases of personality change. "Many parents now opt to home school their children as they are worried about the effects of social class integration in state schools across the United Kingdom on both their child's education and their child's behavioural habits" (ref. fcsn.org/peer/ess.standardsib.html). The level and standard of institution that you are educated in can hugely affect your later life; this is because in some cases you are forced to mature quickly. In conclusion there are many factors which affect identity and are children especially easily influenced. From this essay it is clear that a person's identity is not set in stone at birth and that the majority of the factors that affect our identities are mostly experiential; education, accent, interests, religion etc. Furthermore through evidence from other psychologists, sociologists and scientists alike provides confirmation that the human brain possesses the ability to overcome obstacles such as social class as natural as breathing.