Abstract
This chapter explores some of the methodological and theoretical issues specifically related to the effort to think about the “fluidity” of identity.1 It is informed by an understanding of identities not as ontologized “things,” but as the effects of discursive practices. More specifically, identities are understood herein as performative, as “tenuously constituted in time … through a stylized repetition of acts” and therefore as having “no ontological status apart from the various acts which constitute its reality.”2 This move to resist a substantialized notion of identity directs our attention not to the ways in which identities change or do not change, but rather to the ways in which identities have the appearance of stability or instability over time. And importantly, the emphasis on performativity draws attention to the fact that identities are “done” by actual people (constructed as “doers” in the process of “doing”),3 and creates meaningful theoretical space for a bottom-up approach to IR.
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© 2004 Patricia M. Goff and Kevin C. Dunn
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Arnold, S.L. (2004). “The Language of Respectability” and the (Re)Constitution of Muslim Selves in Colonial Bengal. In: Goff, P.M., Dunn, K.C. (eds) Identity and Global Politics. Culture and Religion in International Relations. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403980496_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403980496_6
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-52772-4
Online ISBN: 978-1-4039-8049-6
eBook Packages: Palgrave Political & Intern. Studies CollectionPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)