Colliding Cultures: What is Identity?

Hey y’all, I’m back. I know it has been a little while, but I’m here now! My class just spent about a month reading and analyzing the famous Native Son by Richard Wright. (I have to say, it was a GREAT book. 9/10, would recommend. I won’t share details though, just read it for yourself!) Anyways, our class also researched five essential questions. I’m not going to tell you about the other four because they aren’t the topic of this post. I would like to focus on the real question- What is Identity?

            You may think that this is the easier one (sorry, Mrs. Smith), but I actually enjoyed this question more than the other four. I think identity is one of the hardest things to find when growing up, which is exactly what Bigger Thomas struggles with as well. Bigger Thomas is the main protagonist in Wright’s novel, Native Son. Throughout the book, Bigger is a black man growing up in Chicago in the 1930s, a tough time for the black community. Segregation and racism are prominent flaws to society at the time and Wright represents that through the setting and atmosphere of the novel. Anyways, that isn’t the point of this post.  To get straight to the point, Bigger found his identity through killing a young white debutante named Mary Dalton. From that point on, Bigger was free, even when he was arrested.

            Why was he free? Well, he freed his own mind and his own personality. He didn’t let society force him to become someone he isn’t. An example of this would be the attempt of murdering his girlfriend, Bessie. He bludgeoned her to almost death, but that made him feel like a person. Society would have shamed for killing a second time, but he went against that. He went against what everyone was telling him and followed what he thought was the best, not everyone else.

            This still holds true to society today, as finding your identity is still a struggle within teenagers going through high school (for the most part). Society drastically changes the minds of the vulnerable- teenagers. Teenagers tend to follow the “norm” so they can “fit in,” but that isn’t what a true identity is. A true identity is found within one’s self, and can be found in any way.

            Let me tell you a story. I know I have digressed a little bit from Native Son, but it will connect in the end! (Hopefully). This isn’t a story about someone finding his or her identity through killing, but a story about a different way of finding an identity. My neighbor and I used to play softball together ever since we knew how to hold a ball. She has two sisters, one older and one younger and she was isolated from her sisters and considered the “weird” and “nerdy” one. By the time she reached high school though, she found herself and her own group of friends that accepted her for the person she was. However, her sisters crushed the relationship between them so badly that they might never become close, like sisters should do.

            I didn’t mean to make that saddening but I wanted to add in a real-world experience because most people aren’t killers like Bigger. I wanted to get the point across that I got from Native Son: No matter where your identity comes from, it’s there. It’s in you and it’s waiting to come out. You just need to go find it.

Thanks for reading. Catch you later!

EG