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Communicating Contradictory Selves: A Critical Postmodern Perspective on Identity Formation

Borchers, Tyler
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1400122385

Abstract Details

2014, Bachelor of Science of Communication Studies (BSC), Ohio University, Communication Studies.
The experience of identity fragmentation is being reported by more people than ever. Long before coinage of the term 'identity fragmentation' the experience it signifies was described by W.E.B. Du Bois as a peculiar sensation of "double consciousness." Traditionally a feature of co-cultural identity formation, fragmentation is the politically produced sensation of an identity divided against itself. Identities are made contradictory by weaponized ideological constraints, linguistic biases, media representations, and bodily marking. Seen through this lens, identity fragments are borne out of the ambivalence of the privileged, who are simultaneously fearful of and fascinated by the Other. Representations of difference are then circulated by popular culture in the form of literary stock characters and stereotypes, cultural material which individuals may knowingly or unknowingly add to their repertoire and emerge later in their self-performances. This perspective brings clarity to the process of self-negotiation by focusing on identity contradiction as a form of intersectional embodiment. It also locates a site of shared space between postmodernists authoring literature theorizing identity contradiction and co-cultural group members who continue to feel its influence with unique intensity. The goal of this thesis is to explore the communication of self-contradictory identities—how we identify and are identified in paradoxical ways—as an exercise of power.
Yea-Wen Chen, Ph.D. (Advisor)
80 p.
Communication; Political Science
identity fragmentation; identity contradiction

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Borchers, T. (2014). Communicating Contradictory Selves: A Critical Postmodern Perspective on Identity Formation [Undergraduate thesis, Ohio University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1400122385

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Borchers, Tyler. Communicating Contradictory Selves: A Critical Postmodern Perspective on Identity Formation. 2014. Ohio University, Undergraduate thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1400122385.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Borchers, Tyler. "Communicating Contradictory Selves: A Critical Postmodern Perspective on Identity Formation." Undergraduate thesis, Ohio University, 2014. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ouhonors1400122385

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

ouhonors1400122385
630
© 2014, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Ohio University Honors Tutorial College and OhioLINK.