Skip to main content

Many Ways-of-Being Across Sites. Identity as (Inter)action

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Identity Revisited and Reimagined

Abstract

The work presented in this chapter takes a social constructionist point of departure on identity. It presents empirically framed analysis of different data-sets from a couple of global North contexts. The data focuses upon identity-positions in contemporary mass-media sites including virtual spaces, academic global spaces and research on aspects of identity. The authors highlight the relevance of decolonial perspectives on these contexts and argue for the need to put the spotlight (again) on understanding identity in terms of performance, as action. In addition to re-emphasizing the need to attend to identity as performance, as action in scholarship, the chapter attempts to illustrate the myriad ways in which such a position gets articulated within and across contemporary sites of interaction, in specific academic genres, and calls for the need to augment these from decolonial perspectives. The chapter attempts to contribute to a small, growing body of literature that calls for the reconfigurations of centers and margins.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    The key word (here identity) and a specified number of words that surround every instance where the key word is used are noted in a concordance-search.

  2. 2.

    It was replaced by the search motor Oria in November 2015.

  3. 3.

    Doctoral theses in these contexts are published in a limited non-commercial edition by the doctoral students’ university.

  4. 4.

    Here attention can be drawn to the Boundary Turn (Bagga-Gupta 2013) other associated turns like the Colonial Turn and the Mobility Turn (Landri and Neuman 2014; Sheller and Urry 2006) in the literature on language, culture and identity since the 1990 s (see also Clifford 1997; Hasnain et al. 2013; Scollan and Scollan 2004).

References

  • Ahlgren, K. (2014). Narrativa identiteter och levande metaforer i ett andraspråksperspektiv (Narrative identities and living metaphors from a second language perspective). Ph.D. thesis, University of Stocholm, Stockholm.

    Google Scholar 

  • Andersson, K. (2008). Talking Violence, Constructing Identity, Young Men in Institutional Care. Ph.D. thesis, University of Linköping, Linkøping.

    Google Scholar 

  • Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at large: Cultural dimensions of globalization. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aurell, M. (2001). Arbete och identitet: Om hur städare blir städare (Work and identity: On how cleaners become cleaners). Ph.D. thesis, University of Linköping, Linkøping.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2004). Challenging understandings in pluralistic societies–language and culture loose in school sites and losing sight of democratic agendas in education? Utbildning och Demokrati. Tidskrift för didaktik och utbildnignspolitik/Education and Democracy. Journal of didactics and politics of education, 13(3), 11–36.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2012). Privileging identity positions and multimodal communication in textual practices: Intersectionality and the (re)negotiation of boundaries. In A. Pitkänen-Huhta & L. Holm (Eds.), Literacy practices in transition: Perspectives from the Nordic countries (pp. 75–100). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2013). The Boundary-Turn. (Re)locating culture, identity and language through the epistemological lenses of time, space and social interactions. In I. Hasnain, S. Bagga-Gupta & S. Mohan (Eds.), Alternative voices: (Re)searching language, culture, identity… (pp. 28–49). Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2014). Languaging: Ways-of-being-with-words across disciplinary boundaries and empirical sites. In H. Paulasto, H. Riionheimo, L. Meriläinen, & M. Kok (Eds.), Language contacts at the crossroads of disciplines (pp. 89–130). Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2015) Language learners and learning language. Webs-of-understandings in the era of reinforced boundaries. Paper at the invited symposium The boundary turn. Challenges in researching and theorizing learning and diversity from decolonial perspectives, 16 biennial EARLI 2015 conference: Towards a reflective society. Synergies between learning, teaching and research, Cyprus, August 25–29 2015.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S. (2017). Going beyond oral-written-signed-virtual divides: Theorizing languaging from social practice perspectives. Writing & Pedagogy, 9(1).

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S., Hasnain, I., & Mohan, S. (2013). Introduction: (re)searching language, culture and identity. In I. Husnain, S. Bagga-Gupta, & S. Mohan (Eds.), Alternative Voices: (re)searching language, culture and identity (pp. 1–27). Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bagga-Gupta, S., Messina Dahlberg, G., & Winther, Y. (2016). Disabling and enabling technologies for learning in higher education-for-all. Issues and challenges for whom? Informatics 3,(21), 1–19. doi:10.3390/informatics3040021

  • Benwell, B., & Stokoe, E. (2006). Discourse and identity. Edinburgh: Edinburg University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bergdahl, I. L. S. (2010). Kärleken utan namn Identitet och (o)synlighet i svenska lesbiska romaner (Love without name and (in)visibility in Swedish novels). Ph.D. thesis, University of Umeå, Umeå.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bhabha, H. (1994). The location of culture. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bjørgen, A. M. (2014). Digitale praksiser i samspill mellom kontekster. En undersøkelse av 9–13 åringers bruk, opplevelser og fortolkninger av digital teknologi i overganger mellom skole og fritid (Digital practices in interplay between contexts. A survey of 9-13 years olds use, experiences and interpretations of digital technology in transition between school and leisure time). Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blommaert, J. (2010). The sociolinguistics of globalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Blix, B. H. (2013). The construction of Sami identity, health, and old age in policy documents and life stories. A discourse analysis and a narrative study. Ph.D. thesis, University of Tromsø, Tromsø.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bovim, R. V. (2010). Arbeidsskapte identiteter: En studie av forutsetninger for identitet og tilhørighet i en organisatorisk kontekst (Work shaped identities. A study of prerequisites for identity and belonging in an organizational context). Ph.D. thesis, The Norwegian University of Science and Tehnology, Trondheim.

    Google Scholar 

  • Breivik, J. K. (2001). Deaf identities in the making: Methaphores and narrations in translocal lives. Ph.D thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Breivik, J. K. (2007). Døv identitet i endring. Lokale liv–globale bevegelser. Deaf identity in change. Local lives–global movements. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bruner, J. (1990). Culture and human development: A new look. Human Development 33, 344–355. https://doi.org/10.1159/000276535.

  • Bucholtz, M., & Hall, K. (2005). Identity and interaction: A sociocultural linguistic approach. Discourse Studies, 7(4–5), 585–614.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Craig, E. (Ed.). (1998). Routledge encyclopedia of philosophy. London and New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis, J. E. (2003). The commodification of self. The Hedgehog Review, 5(2), 41–49.

    Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, E. H. (1968). Identity: youth and crisis. London: Faber & Faber

    Google Scholar 

  • Eriksen, I. M. (2013). Young norwegians: Belonging and becoming in a multiethnic high school. Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Felberg, T. (2008). Brothers in arms? Discourse analysis of Serbian and Montenegrin identities and relations as constructed in Politika and Pobjeda front page articles during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999. Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ferrier, M. (2015). Rising star: meet Oslo’s 15-year-old answer to Tavi Gevinson. The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2015/may/20/rising-star-meet-oslos-15-year-old-answer-to-tavi-gevinson

  • Gal, S., & Irvine, J. T. (1995). The boundaries of languages and disciplines: How ideologies construct difference. Social Research, 62(4), 967–1001.

    Google Scholar 

  • Garcia, O. (2009). Bilingual education in the 21st century: A global perspective. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gleason, P. (1983). Identifying identity: A semantic history. The Journal of American History, 69(4), 910–931.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hasnain, I., Bagga-Gupta, S., & Mohan, S. (Eds.). (2013). Alternative voices: (Re)searching language, culture, identity. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haugseth, J. F. (2012). Forenklingens logikk: En studie av reproduksjonen av profesjonell identitet i IKT-organisasjoner (The logic of simplification. A study of reproduction of professional identity in ICT-organisations). Ph.D. thesis, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holland, D., Lachicotte, W., Jr., Skinner, D., & Cain, C. (1998). Identity and Agency in Cultural Worlds. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kraus, P. A. (2012). The politics of complex diversity: A European Perspective. Ethnicities 12(1), 3–25.

    Google Scholar 

  • Landri, P., & Neuman, E. (2014). Introduction. Mobile Sociologies of Education. European Educational Research Journal, 13(1), 1–8.

    Google Scholar 

  • Linell, P. (2009) Rethinking Language, Mind, and World Dialogically. Interactional and Contextual Theories of Human Sense-making. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mäkitalo, Å., & Säljö, R. (2000). Talk in institutional context and institutional context in talk. Categories and situated practices. Text, 22(1), 57–82.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maldonado-Torres, N. (2011). Thinking through the decolonial turn: Post-continental Interventions in theory, philosophy, and critique—An introduction. Transmodernity: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World, 1(2), 1–15.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mellingen, H. I. (2013). Fra smertespråk til lykkenormativitet. Kjønn, seksualitet og religiøs identitet i et performativitetsperspektiv (From the language of pain to the normativity of happiness. Gender, sexuality and religious identity in a performativity perspective). Ph.D. thesis, University of Agder, Kristiansand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mignolo, W. (2000). (Post) Occidentalism, (Post) Coloniality, and (Post) Subaltern Rationality. In F. Afzal-Khan & K. Seshadri-Crooks (Eds.), The Pre-Occupation of postcolonial studies (pp. 86–118). Durham: Duke UP.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mignolo, W. (2009). Epistemic disobedience, independent thought and decolonial freedom. Theory, Culture and Society, 26(7–8), 159–181.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Moss, S.M. (2015). Negotiations of identities in Rwqanda, Zanzibar and Sudan. Ph.D. thesis, Norwegian University of science and Technology, Trondheim.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ohnstad, A. (2009). Lesbiske identiteter: skeive bevegelser (Lesbian identities: quer movements). Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Olaussen I. (2010). Disability, technology & politics: the etangled experience of being hard of hearing. Ph.D. thesis,University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Olsson, A. (2015). Is this girl the future. Norwegian.com. Retrieved from http://www.norwegian.com/magazine/features/2015/07/is-this-girl-the-future

  • Omoniyi, T. (2015). Illusions and delusions of the centre within the framework of globalization. Invited symposium at conference The Sociolinguistics of Globalisation: (De)centering and (de)standerdization. The University of Hong Kong. June 3–6 2015.

    Google Scholar 

  • Paasi, A. (2002). The problem with spatial identity: revisiting the “sense of place”. Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie., 93(2), 37–148.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rosén, J. K., & Bagga-Gupta, S. (2013). Shifting identity positions in the development of language education for immigrants: An analysis of discourses associated with ‘Swedish for immigrants’. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 26(1), 68–88.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Säljö, R. (2005) Lärande och kulturella redskap: Om lärprocessser och det kollektiva minnet. [Learning and Cultural Artefacts: On Learning Processes and Collective Memory]. Stockholm: Prisma.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sandve, B. (2014). Staging the real: Identity politics and urban space in mainstream Norwegian rap music. Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schreiner, C. (2006). EXPLORING A ROSE-GARDEN Norwegian youth’s orientations towards science–seen as signs of late modern identities Based on ROSE (The Relevance of Science Education), a comparative study of 15 year old students’ perceptions of science and science education. Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scollan, R., & Scollan, S. W. (2004). Nexus analysis. Discourse and the emerging internet. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sebrant, U. (2000). Organiserande och identitet: om arbetsorganisation i geriatrisk vård (Organising and identity: about work organisation in geriatric health care). Ph.D. thesis. Stockholms University, Stockholm.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sheller, M., & Urry, J. (2006). The new mobilities paradigm. Environment and Planning A, 38(2), 207–226. doi:10.1068/a37268

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Skatvedt, A.H. (2009). Alminnelighetens potensial: en sosiologisk studie av følelser, identitet og terapeutisk endring (The potential of commonality: a socological study of emotions, identity and therapeutic change). Ph.D. thesis, University of Oslo, Oslo.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stjerna, M.L. (2007). Föreställningar om mat och ätande. Risk, kropp, identitet och den “frågasatta” maten i vår tid (Notions of food and eating. Risk, identity, the body and ‘contested’ food in contemporary society). Ph.D. thesis,University of Stockholm, Stockholm.

    Google Scholar 

  • Straszer, B. (2011). “Ungerska för rötternas skull”: Språkval och identitet bland andragenerationens ungrare i Sverige och Finland (Language choice and identity among second-generation Hungarians in Sweden and Finland). Ph.D. thesis, Uppsala University, Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia Uralica Upsalienisa, Uppsala.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, C. (1989). Sources of the self: The making of a modern identity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tønseth, C. (2011). Voksne i læring: Identitetskonstruksjon i lys av Kompetansereformen (Learning adults. Identity constructions in light of the Reform of Competency). Ph.D. thesis, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim.

    Google Scholar 

  • Vertovec, S. (2006). The emergence of super-diversity in Britain. Centre of Migration, Policy and Society. University of Oxford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wetherell, M. (2010). The field of identity research. In M. Wetherell & C. T. M. Mohanty (Eds.), The sage handbook of identities (pp. 3–26). London: Sage Publications.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Wetherell, M., & Mohanty, C. T. M. (Eds.). (2010). The SAGE handbook of identities. London: SAGE Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Willey, T. (2006). The lessons of historical investigation: Investigations for the study of language policy and planning. In T. Ricento (Ed.), An introduction to language policy: Theory and method (pp. 13–152). Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

Ref Elise By Olsen http://www.ink-live.com/emagazines/norwegian-magazine/1978/july-2015/#1/z

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sangeeta Bagga-Gupta .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Bagga-Gupta, S., Feilberg, J., Hansen, A.L. (2017). Many Ways-of-Being Across Sites. Identity as (Inter)action. In: Bagga-Gupta, S., Hansen, A., Feilberg, J. (eds) Identity Revisited and Reimagined. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-58056-2_1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-58056-2_1

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-58055-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-58056-2

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics