Introductory description

Forms of Identity investigates a wide range of identities (e.g. personal, national, gender, ethnic, racial, spiritual, linguistic, genetic, organisational) through interactive seminars, readings, and practical exercises which will support students in reflecting on major issues associated with these themes in an interdisciplinary manner. It will encourage students to consider the increasing prominence of consumer, hybrid, border, and marginal identities, and the notion that identity can shift, that it can be fragmented, and that a variety of identities can exist simultaneously. Each week, a different subject specialist from, for example, sociology, politics, biology, philosophy, psychology or the arts, will introduce their discipline’s understanding of identity, which will be followed by a consolidation session, geared to facilitate active, interdisciplinary engagement with the topics. This module will be in blended format.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

Week 1: Introduction to ‘Forms of Identity’
This week will introduce students to the module: content, teaching and assessment. Students will draw on their existing knowledge and disciplinary approaches to begin reflecting on their learning journey through the theme of ‘identity’.

Week 2: Social Constructions of Identity
This week will explore ‘Identity’ through a sociological lens. It will examine theories on socialisation and group identities, by looking specifically at gender and identity.

Week 3: Migration and National Identity
This week will explore identity through a geopolitical lens. The focus here will be on national identification and migration.

Week 4: Identity: Race, Ethnicity and Religion
This week will explore race, ethnicity and spiritual identity through a case study focusing on transnational education.

Week 5: Personal Identity
This week will explore personal identity as it touches on narrative and mental health, as seen through the disciplines of Psychology and Philosophy.

Week 6: Identity and Genetics
This week will examine ‘Identity’ from a scientific perspective, looking at the interplay between genetics and identity.

Week 7: Language, Discourse & Identity
This week will examine the role of language and discursive practices as linked to identity. It will explore identity from a sociolinguistics perspective.

Week 8: Identity and Media
This week will explore the role of the media in the reproduction of identities.

Week 9: Organisational, Brand and Reputation
This week will explore identity in the context of organisations (e.g. brand identities and/or communities).

Week 10: SDA Showcase & Peer Review
This week will be an opportunity for students to present their preliminary SDA work and to receive formative feedback from their peers. Students will be given the opportunity to reflect on their learning journey over the course of the module, as a concluding activity.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• 1. Critically appraise different disciplinary approaches in the investigation of how identities are formed, changed or imposed.
• 2. Imaginatively respond to complex problems through the creation of a coherent and justified thesis on the theme of identity, that is interdisciplinary in nature.
• 3. Exhibit a sustained critical and reflective analysis of sources and arguments in order to develop their own informed ideas and judgements.
• 4. Critically reflect on and evaluate their subject knowledge, interdisciplinary learning and independent research, including how it can be made accessible to wider audiences (where relevant).
• 5. Reference and communicate ideas in a way that demonstrates a distinguished grasp of professional and scholarly practice.
• 6. Design and manage their own interdisciplinary academic and research activity.

Indicative reading list

Anderson, B. (2016) Imagined Communities: reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. London: Verso.

Barker, M. Iantaffi, A. (2019) Life isn’t binary: on being both, beyond and in-between. London: Jessica Kingsley.

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

Billig, M. (1995) Banal Nationalism. London: Sage.

Brown, A.D. (2020) The Oxford handbook of identities in organizations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Butler, J. (2004) Undoing Gender. New York: Routledge.

Du Gay, P., et al. (2008) Identity: A Reader. London: Sage.

Ganna, A., Verweij, K.J.H., Nivard, M.G., Maier, R., Wedow, R., Busch, A.S., Abdellaoui, A., Guo, S., Sathirapongsasuti, J.F., Lichtenstein, P., Lundström, N., Auton, A., Mullan Harris, K., Beecham, G.W., Martin, E.R., Sanders, A.R., Perry, J.R.B., Neale, B.M., Zietsch, B.P. (2019) ‘Large-scale GWAS reveals insights into the genetic architecture of same-sex sexual behaviour’. Science. 365(6456).

Halberstam, J. (2018) Trans*: a quick and quirky account of gender variability. Oakland: University of California Press.

Hooks, B. (2015) Ain’t I a woman: Black women and feminism. New York: Routledge.

Maalouf, A. (2000) In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong. London: Penguin.

Meer, N. (2013) ‘Racialization and religion: race, culture and difference in the study of antisemitism and Islamophobia’. Ethnic and Racial Studies. 36(3), 385-398.

Modood, T. (2022) Multicultural politics: racism, ethnicity and Muslims in Britain. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Monk, N., Lindgren, M., McDonald, S. Pasfield-Neofitou, S. (2018) Reconstructing Identity: A Transdisciplinary Approach. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Morris-Reich, A. & Rupnow, D. (2017) Ideas of ‘race’ in the history of the humanities. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Parfit, D. (1971) ‘Personal Identity’. The Philosophical Review. 80(1), 3-27.

Rutherford, A. (2018) A brief history of everyone who ever lived: the human story retold through our genes. New York: The Experiment.

Taylor, K. (2017) How we get free: black feminism and the Combahee River Collective. Chicago: Haymarket.

Williams, B. (1970) ‘The Self and the Future’. The Philosophical Review. 79(2), 161-180.

View reading list on Talis Aspire

Research element

All students will undertake an individual, supervised research project in the form of a Student-Devised Assessment (SDA). Students will work closely with their tutor to develop an interdisciplinary project in an agreed format which best articulates their ideas, and will satisfy the learning outcomes for this module. Students who do not choose a traditional academic writing structure for this project (e.g. essay, report) will be required to supplement their piece with an accompanying document which will satisfy the learning outcomes for this module.

Interdisciplinary

This module introduces the theme of ‘identity’ through different disciplinary lenses. Each week, students will be exposed to new disciplinary approaches towards the topic by a specialist contributor (first, in the format of a pre-recorded lecture to be accessed asynchronously online, and then a face-to-face workshop to engage with these themes actively). They will then be given the opportunity to consolidate their knowledge and weekly readings in an interdisciplinary format. Each specialist contributor will be asked to provide a case study example of how each discipline approaches and contextualises the theories/concepts introduced, so that students are made aware of problem-based learning and the benefits/limitations of tackling them via a single disciplinary approach. Interdisciplinary learning calls for collaboration, and therefore students will be assigned into multidisciplinary working groups to complete weekly tasks together outside of class. Both assessment formats on this module will encourage students to examine a source or an issue in an interdisciplinary manner, and are designed to facilitate reflective thinking as a significant component of interdisciplinary work.

International

Each week students will be required to reflect on the international, intercultural and/or transnational potential of the overarching theme, ‘identity’ in the 1.5 hour consolidation session. Specialist Contributors will also be asked to add an international element to their sessions. For example, the unit on migration will discuss ‘hybrid’ identities that are a result of international, and/or transnational mobility.

Subject specific skills

Students on the module will develop an understanding of the limits of notions such as the nature of individual identity broadly, national identity, bodily identity, gender identity, ethnic identity, personal identity, organisational identity, and spiritual identity. They will make decisions concerning the importance of consumer, hybrid, border, and marginal identities, and the notion that identity can shift, that it can be fragmented, and that a variety of identities can exist simultaneously. They will explore the relationship between the mind and the body in the formation of identity.

Transferable skills

Students will develop an awareness of the limits of traditionally distinct but well-established disciplines. They will develop problem-based learning skills, including interdisciplinary/transdisciplinary approaches, and the significance of critical reflection in these processes. They will develop communication skills, as they design and manage their own academic and research activity, while also stimulating team-work, collaboration, and ultimately the provision of peer review and evaluation.