Blog 2: Sense of Self Identity

Throughout this class on women's writing, a common theme has continually emerged as an important element of feminist writing.  This common topic is self identity and is popular because women's writing is constantly being critiqued for the  lack of a sound and concrete personal distinctiveness.  Self identity is deeply examined in Trinh T. Minh-ha's "Not You/Like You" piece and throughout the introduction to the chapter on Identity and Difference.  Personally, I think it is extremely interesting that women writers are so often evaluated within the realm of the way in which men have written through the lens of a very narrow and single minded scope.  I find this so interesting because I do not think it is possible to identify oneself as specifically one term due to the fact as humans and women, we play a number of different roles.  For example, as a woman, it is possible to be a wife, a mother, a professional, a daughter, a sister, and more, all at the same time while also integrating other portions of identity such as age, ethnic or racial makeup.  Therefore, I think that women writers have a more realistic view on the ability for one's identity to be composed of a number of different elements that impact the way we think and write as women.  Furthermore, being able to look at an issue with an open mind and within a broad spectrum of possibilities, creates the opportunity for women to write creatively and from a point of view that may not have been previously examined by our male counterparts.  In addition, the "Social Identity Theory," originally developed by Henri Tajfel argued that a person's self identity is created through group membership which creates the discriminatory ideas of "us" and "them."  In the realm of feminist writing this makes sense due to the fact that women's writing is often times assessed by males on an extremely high standard.  Using the Social Identity Theory supports the idea that men would inherently find negative aspects on women's writing to enhance their self image because of way the groups are organized, which in this case would be male vs. female. 
Social Identity Theory:  This link displays an article discussing the social identity theory which provided the information on the categorization of self identity.