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Identity Theory
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 Mutilating
the Body : Identity in Blood and Ink by Kim
Hewitt
This scholarly discussion places acts of body
mutilation within a conceptual framework that explores their
similarities and dissimilarities, but ultimately interprets them
as acts that ask to be witnessed. The author explores
self-mutilation through history and across cultural divisions,
finding these acts
The language of the body cannot be denied. In
today's culture, many people are claiming their bodies as their
prime material to create and express their identity--scratching,
starving, tattooing, and piercing their desire for autonomy and
spirituality upon their bodies. They instinctively turn to the
body as a potent medium of flesh and blood, pleasurable and
painful sensations, and adornment that enables them to write their
stories upon their bodies.
About the Author
Kim Hewitt is a writer who is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in
American Civilization at the University of Texas at Austin. Her
interests include the history and influence of eastern
philosophies in the United States, utopian communities,
spirituality, and altered consciousness.
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An affirmation of the appended self.
Calculated. Queerational.
Implicated. Polyvocal. Schizoid...
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Seyla Benhabib
Excerpt:
A decade ago a symposium took place at the Law
School of the State University of New York at Buffalo as part of the
James McCormick Mitchell Lecture Series. The participants were Carol
J. Gilligan, Catharine A. MacKinnon, Ellen C. DuBois, Carrie J.
Menkel-Meadow and others. This symposium sent a sharp signal of the
great clash of paradigms within contemporary feminist theory which
was about to unfold in the coming years. I will use the term
“paradigm” in non-technical fashion to refer to a coherent set
of assumptions, some articulated and some not, which guide,
influence, structure, or help “format” a vision of theory and of
politics...
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Identity is the official journal of the Society
for Research on Identity Formation (SRIF). This cutting-edge new
journal is published by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates and is
subsidized with grants from the Faculty of Social Science at the
University of Western Ontario and the College of Arts and Science at
Florida International University.
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Internet
Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Excerpt:
Identity theory is a position in the philosophy of
mind which maintains that mental states and brain activities are
identical, though viewed from two perspectives. Identity theory is a
form of monistic materialism, insofar as it maintains that mind is
essentially material in nature. As such, it is an alternative to
classical dualism which holds that minds and mental events are made
of a spiritual substance which is distinct from one's material body.
Identity theory was developed to address the short comings of
behaviorism, which maintains that mental terms designate
dispositions to behave in certain ways. The key difference is that
behaviorism denies mental states (focusing instead on only
observable behavior); identity theory, by contrast, acknowledges
mental states but identifies them with brain activity. Further,
whereas behaviorism is usually seen as a semantic theory about the
meaning of terms, identity theory is a scientific claim about mental
states and brain activities themselves...
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Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Excerpt:
The simplest and most general statement of the
identity theory of truth is that when a truth-bearer (e.g. a
proposition) is true, there is a truth-maker (e.g. a fact)
with which it is identical and the truth of the former consists
in its identity with the latter. The theory is best understood
by contrast with a rival such as the correspondence theory,
according to which the relation of truth-bearer to truth-maker is
correspondence rather than identity...
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A radical web community which introduces queer
theory concepts and an unapologetic celebration of CHOOSING to be
queer to a primarily non-academic audience.
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Excerpt:
One of the most important aspects of a child's
emotional development is the formation of his self-concept, or
identity--namely, his sense of who he is and what his relation to
other people is. The most conspicuous trend in children's growing
self-awareness is a shift from concrete physical attributes to more
abstract characteristics. This shift is apparent in those
characteristics children emphasize when asked to describe
themselves. Young children--four to six years of age--seem to define
themselves
in terms of such observable characteristics as hair color, height,
or
their favorite activities. But within a few years, their
descriptions of themselves shift to more abstract, internal, or
psychological qualities, including their competences and skills
relative to those of others. Thus, as children approach adolescence,
they tend to increasingly define themselves by the unique and
individual quality of their feelings, thoughts, and beliefs rather
than simply by external characteristics.
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By Ann Ferguson
Excerpt:
Adrienne Rich's paper "Compulsory
Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence" suggests two important
theses for further development by feminist thinkers. First, she
maintains that compulsory heterosexuality is the central social
structure perpetuating male domination. Second, she suggests a
reconstruction of the concept lesbian in terms of a
cross-cultural, transhistorical lesbian continuum which can capture
women's ongoing resistance to patriarchal domination. Rich's paper
is an insightful and significant contribution to the development of
a radical feminist approach to patriarchy, human nature, and sexual
identity. Her synthetic and creative approach is a necessary first
step to further work on the concept of compulsory heterosexuality.
Nonetheless, her position contains serious flaws from a
socialist-feminist perspective. In this paper I shall argue against
her main theses while presenting a different, historically linked
concept of lesbian identity...
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Theory, gender and identity resources.
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