How Is Indentity Formed and Sustained?

Identity follows society wherever it goes. It develops over time through encounters and experiences. Careful examination is needed in order to understand how identity is formed and sustained. Through written works and documented experiences, society shows how identity changes and matures over time. In Susan Saulny's, Black? White? Asian? Most Young Americans Choose All of the Above, identity is formed through one's races and background regardless of what others see on the outside. In Barack Obama's autobiography, Dreams From My Father, young Barack struggles in trying to find his own identity in a world that judges people by their cover rather than their character. Caucasians often struggle to find identity, being known as the "majority" in the United States. However, one brave third grade teacher showed her students what it meant to be different. Identity is not innate. It is formed through societal values and misconceptions of who people are. It is much easier to assume something about someone rather than getting to know them. In order to find identity, one must find themselves.

""I think it's really important to acknowledge who you are and everything that makes you that," said Ms. Wood" (Saulny 259). Ms. Wood was a 19-year-old student at the University of Maryland. She also happened to be the vice president of the university's Multiracial and Biracial Student Association. ""If someone tries to call me black I say, 'yes--and white.' People have the right not to acknowledge everything, but don't do it because society tells you that you can't" (259) the young vice president continued. Students at the university acknowledged themselves for who they were - strong individuals with backgrounds that may not be entirely accepted by society.

Everybody has the right to individualism. Being an individual requires an openness to one's self and being able to accept everything about their self. Maryland's multiracial group promotes their students to accept except themselves for more than what society sees. These students are "asserting their freedom to identity as they choose" (260). This is the first step in forming identity. Being comfortable with who you are and not caring who knows is what forms identity. The freedom of being one's self is in the foundation of this country. There is no real "white" or "black" race. There are hundreds of countries on this planet and most people have connections to more than one. So why do people feel like they have to choose a side? Ms. Lopez-Mullins was asked what she thought of multiculturalism. She said people who accept their multiculturalism "don't want to label themselves based on other people's interpretations of who they are" (261). Accepting one's background is forming identity and sustaining it. Through acknowledgement of that they are themselves. However, not everyone comes to this realization so easily and even struggle with their identity.

As Barack Obama grew up, he struggled with his identity. Obama was half black and half white, but saw himself as what he was on the outside. He always thought the other kids were judging him for what they saw. On Barry's first day of school, his classmates picked him and the one other black girl as being boyfriend and girlfriend. They teased the two of them saying "Coretta's got a boyfriend!". This embarrassed Barry. He repeated to his classmates that she wasn't his girlfriend and eventually screamed at her to leave him alone. Coretta ran away and Barry felt terrible. "My act of betrayal bought me some room from other children, and like Coretta, I was mostly left alone" (Obama 62). Barry felt like betraying who he was on the outside would exile him from others who looked like him. This was the first instance of Barry seeing himself as "black".

As time went by Barry always stood up for his "race" and looked down upon those who believed themselves not to be defined by the color of their skin, but as individuals, just like everybody else. In his freshman year of college he asked one girl, Joyce, if she was going to the Black Students' Association meeting. ""I'm not black... I'm multiracial... Why should I have to choose between them?""(99)