UNMASKING THE TRUE SELF

By Akin Ojumu Identity is like a fingerprint; it reveals the person. It’s the distinctive quality or trait that makes an individual unique. Peter Burke describes identity as that which “tells us who we are and announces to others who we are.” Our identity is the silent witness of all our deeds. Outside of philosophy, personal identity usually refers to properties to which we feel a special sense of attachment or ownership. Someone’s personal identity in this sense consists of those properties she takes to “define him as a person” or “make him the person he is”, and which distinguish him from others. Collective identity is that in which an individual’s identity is strongly associated with role-behavior or the collection of group memberships that define them. Race, tribe, ethnicity, nationality, religion, and profession are some of the affiliations and associations that collectively, and to varying degrees, define a person’s identity. How an individual sees himself is primarily determine