The more I think about our discussion on the essentiality of others to our own identity, the more I toy with the question I offered during class: What happens to the identity of a person living as a recluse? Unlike the examples of feral children that suppose the child is devoid of human contact from birth, the recluse has in fact "had the potential" (I phrase it this way because Sartre's understanding of identity is still very much theoretical in my opinion) to understand himself through others. At least in the examples I have considered, it isn't until later in life (usually after some deep introspection or cosmic realization of sorts) that the individual pulls away from society to live a solitary lifestyle. At this point, Sartre could certainly argue that the influence by others up to that point is what determines the individual's identity. And yet, I wonder: Without further human interaction, will the recluse forevermore understand his/her self in terms of those human interactions that preceded his lifestyle change? Or, is he/she capable of further developing the notion of the self without human interaction (meaning that identity-by-others is merely a requisite for consciousness, but once a preliminary understanding of the self is developed, the input of others loses necessity for subsequent change)?
Yours Tru.ly
I feel the example of Rome’s founding is not a very good example because it is a myth and wouldn’t really help explain anything. Obviously Rome wasn’t founded by two brothers that were raised by a she-wolf. But the feral children examples in general are a good inquiry for the topic in question.
ReplyDeleteBut I would like to discuss your second part about the recluse. I feel that the recluse at that point and the time following when it was decided they were to be to live in solitude would still be able to identify themselves through themselves. I feel that Sartre’s writing, or at least how I am to understand it, is too black or white. I feel personally that while the influences of others plays a significant role on many aspects of our lives and helps shape our identities after sometime we are able to shape our own identities by our own influences; that there can come an indeterminate point, which differs for everyone, in which an individual can influence themselves. There would have to be some kind of realization of the influence by others and then the person would have to decide how much of their identity they want to control themselves. Of course everything would have to come from somewhere and all the pieces an individual would use to create their own unique identity would come from these outside influences and experiences. It could be argued then that their identity then is not unique because they got it all from something (someone) else but I feel it is how they use these outside factors and the unique way they choose to combine those pieces is how someone can create and control their own identity that isn’t directly controlled by others.
Ps: Sorry for the scatterbrain-esqueness of my writing at this time.
-kyle