Summary of the article: Self-Access as Access to Self: Cultural Variation in the Notions of Self and Personhood

In the article Self-Access as Access to Self: Cultural Variation in the Notions of Self and Personhood Philip Riley (2003) discusses identity regarding socialization and its relationship between this subject and the main topic of the book where this article can be found: autonomy across cultures. In order to support his ideas, the author brings up three fields of study that can prove how identity can relate to language at some point: Anthropology, Social Psychology and Linguistics. But before, Riley cites the notion of identity to start his text.Firstly, Riley gets the expression personal identity and divides it into two constituents: person and self. Person is the way society defines an individual and sorts them into multiple categories, addressed as you. Self is the way an individual sees themself as private and subjective, addressed as I/me. Regarding these categories, Riley mentions it is impossible to qualify someone in just one group. He gives the example of a woman called Mary; she is defined by her age cohort, gender and family, occupation and so on. An important part of Rileys text is when he relates his examples to language. He says that it is possible to see that in these categories, there are expressions such as cashier and mother that define a person according to their identity, making language an important tool. Moreover, he cites that according to the way Mary speaks to people and vice versa can influence the way she is defined. As it was demonstrated, language is very important in this identity topic so the author includes language learner in these categories.Identity is such a complex field and in order to better understand it, Riley defines three of the major disciplines mentioned in the very beginning. The first one is Anthropology and, according to him, its target is the question: What does it mean to be a human being?, in other words, language as part of an individuals identity. He mentions Mauss (1938), one of the most important scholars in this area. Mauss says that there existed in the past bounded societies consisting of totemic clans, and this means that people were born in specific categories with specific functions. One example nowadays is the aristocratic society. The second field mentioned is the Social Psychology. George Herbert Mead (1934), an important sociologist, believes that minds and selves come from the result of interaction with other people through language, and the mind means the internal conversation that an individual has. He says that it might happen because we are born with this characteristic of intra-action (individually) and interaction (socially). Therefore, it is not right to say that individual and social are completely different, taking into account the fact that they are crucial to the learning process.The last but not least important is the third field: Linguistics. Riley says that as two important fields related to language have already been mentioned, it is also very important to mention linguistics. He labels it as the primary mechanism for the development of an identity. Two important scholars Mhlhuser and Harr (1990) came up with the examination of dozens of languages. They conclude saying that according to the social space, positions and functions, the native speakers will vary some characteristics of their language, making it an aspect of their identity. After presenting all these arguments, it is possible to agree with Philip Riley when he says that identity is a very complex field and it can be seen in many different areas. By talking about identity, language will always be around since it is needed to interact with people or even with oneself. The author concludes stating that the only danger is the unequal linguistic competence when, for instance, a non-native speaker tries to communicate with a native one and this attempt can be threatened. Therefore, Riley says that there are some other ways to reduce this risk, but they need to be further studied.

RILEY, Philip. Self-Access to Self: Cultural Variation in the Notions of Self and Personhood (Chapter 5) In: Learner Autonomy Across Cultures. PALFREYMAN, D. & SMITH, R. Palgrave (Eds.), MacMillan, 2003.