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5

Identity and Society

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  • What does “identity” mean?

  • How is one’s identity formed?

  • How do personal experiences affect our identity?

  • To what extent do institutions emphasize conformity at the expense of individuality?

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?

It’s a line that most everyone has heard from childhood: the Evil Queen from Snow White asking her magic mirror if she’s the prettiest in the kingdom. For years, the mirror replies exactly as she hoped—“You, my queen, are fairest of all.” When, however, Snow White begins to eclipse the queen in beauty, the magic mirror tells her so.

Think about this idea for a minute. Where does the Queen look for confirmation of her own beauty? Not to a regular mirror that would reveal her own true reflection, but rather to a magic mirror that doesn’t reflect her own image at all, but only compares the Queen’s image to other people’s beauty. The Queen’s identity is not tied to her self, but to others, whom she tries — unsuccessfully — to control.

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Look at another mirror. This one is from a poem by Sylvia Plath, a brilliant but troubled poet who took her own life at the age of thirty-one.