Cultural identity is constantly being torn down and rebuilt. Though both processes always occur, sometimes one is dominant. It seems to me that the two places I spend most of my time (the USA and China) are experiencing opposing processes more. China seems focused on creating its identity, and through Xi Jinping’s politics has developed a strong idea of where it wants to go. Meanwhile, the USA is currently missing a robust sense of what it is and wants to be (epitomized by the difficulty of getting opposing sides to agree on basic ideas like whether the scientific method is trustworthy). This is doubtless a simplistic diagnosis, but I believe there’s some truth to it.
What cultural identity is, where it comes from, and how we can influence it for the betterment of society, is a fascinating topic for study. It is not an overstatement to say that it affects all parts of life, in both good and bad ways. Perhaps if we had a better understanding of cultural identity, we would see less violent actions taken in defense of one’s system of belief. As long as it remains a mystery, there will probably be many people who are unwilling to let go of their own culture for fear of what will happen if they do. In the following papers, there are some valuable tools which can help us with this project.
- John Lysaker, “Giving Voice to Philosophy,” Journal of Speculative Philosophy, 2018.
- Ol’ga Zhukova, “Nikolai Karamzin’s Philosophy of History in Russia’s Intellectual Culture,” Russian Studies in Philosophy, 2017.
- Jing Yin, “Beyond postmodernism: a non-western perspective on identity,” Journal of Multicultural Discourses, September 2018.
- Beatrice Boufoy-Bastick, “Culturometrics: A Constructionist Philosophy for Humanistic Inquiry in Qualitative Identity Research,” Qualitative Report, February 3, 2014.
- Taesoo Lee, “Philosophy as Self-Examination and Korean Philosophy,” Journal of Philosophical Research, 2012.
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