Identity emerges in discourse rather than preceding it

Evidence

The five principles proposed here – Emergence, Positionality, Indexicality, Relationality, and Partialness – represent the varied ways in which different kinds of scholars currently approach the question of identity. … Even researchers whose primary goals lie elsewhere can contribute to this project by providing sophisticated conceptualizations of how human dynamics unfold in discourse, along with rigorous analytic tools for discovering how such processes work. … While identity has been a widely circulating notion in sociocultural linguistic research for some time, few scholars have explicitly theorized the concept. … By positing, in keeping with recent scholarship, that identity is emergent in discourse and does not precede it, we are able to locate identity as an intersubjectively achieved social and cultural phenomenon. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction, 119

Categorization

• DEFINE: States the core theoretical stance: identity is not a pre-existing essence but is produced intersubjectively in interaction.
• XREF: connects to: Identity theories lag behind the linguistic research that has made identity central. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 4; Identity is constituted through social action and language rather than merely reflected in behavior — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 19; Repeated stances in interaction accrue into enduring identities like gender — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 62 (+11 more)

Broader Connections

• Identity is constructed through discourse and dialogic interaction, not self-creation #corroborates (0.96) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 23
• Linguistics decentered identity by showing subjects are positioned in pre-existing discourse #corroborates (0.95)
• Identity arises from action and struggle rather than preceding politics #corroborates (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 121
• Discourse constrains but does not fully determine what can be said #qualifies (0.78) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 55
• Identity is constituted through relation to what is other and different from itself #qualifies (0.76) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 378
• Self-presentation fails when small stylistic details betray an intended identity #exemplifies (0.75) — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 618
• Identity is formed through contrast with difference #qualifies (0.74)
• Identities are reinforced by outsider-given labels #expands (0.73)
• Identity is constructed through opposition to a continuously reinterpreted other #qualifies (0.72)
• Identity is both a source of agency and increasingly constructed rather than given #qualifies (0.72)