In addition to this first lens of identification, Hall offers a different lens of what cultural identity can be seen as. The meaning of cultural identity has become not just of the shared similarities, it has developed through recognizing the "differences that constitutes what we really are--what we have become." Identification is transforming everyday. In short, cultural identification changes through time and place. What we identified ourselves as fifty years ago may not be the same as how we identify ourselves now because through history and the future events that will become history, identity is always changing, transforming to fit the ideals and experiences of the people.
In Hall's new view of cultural identity, I agree that our identity is not absolute. We continue to lean toward identifying ourselves as more that one kind of people. We are or are becoming a new culture altogether, we are hybrids. Living in America, the land of displacements, the acceptance of a changing identity has become easier.Although we may still want to claim our origins from the host land, we also have a sense of claiming what we are in this new land. Diaspora communities are evolving and through a more definite explanation of diaspora, it is a "recognition of heterogeneity and diversity" It is an identity that we are creating.
Overall, through Hall's passage, he has brought wisdom and knowledge to us by reinforcing our understanding of how we have been identifying ourselves without realizing that we are already categorizing ourselves into this lens that he has presented.
Question: Hall has identified himself as Jamaican black men who was raised in London. How has he come to accept his identity when it may have been a major issue of his life?
BY: Mai Vang
Hall, Stuart. "Cultural Identity and Diaspora." Colonial Discourse and Post-colonial Theories: a Reader. ED. Patrick Williams and Chrisman. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. 1994. 392-401.
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