SELF

SOCIETY
CULTURE
 What is the SELF?
The self, in contemporary literature and even common
sense, is commonly defined by the following characteristics:
“separate, self-contained, independent, consistent, unitary,
and private” (Stevens 1996). By SEPARATE, it is meant that
the self is distinct from other selves. The self is always
unique and has its own identity. One cannot be another
person. Even twins are distinct from one another. Second,
self is also SELF-CONTAINED and INDEPENDENT because in
itself it can exist. Its distinctness allows it to be self-
contained with its own thoughts, characteristics, and
volition. It does not require any other self for it to exist. It is
CONSISTENT because it has a personality that is enduring
and therefore can be expected to persist for quite some
time. Its consistency, therefore, allows it to be studied,
described, and measured. Consistency also means that a
particular self’s traits, characteristics, tendencies, and
potentialities are more or less the same. Self is UNITARY in
that it is the center of all experiences and thoughts that run
through a certain person. It is like the chief command post in
an individual where all processes, emotions, and thoughts
converge. Finally, the self is PRIVATE. Each person sorts out
information, feelings and emotions, and thought processes
within the self. This whole process is never accessible to
anyone but the self.
This last characteristic of the self, its being private, suggests
that the self is isolated from external world. It lives within its
own world. However, we also see that this potential clash
between the self and the external reality is what spells fro the
self what it might be, what it can be, and what it will be. From
this perspective then, one can see that the self is
always at the mercy of external circumstances that bump and collide
with it. It is ever changing and dynamic, allowing external influences
to take part in it shaping. The concern then of this lesson is in
understanding this vibrant relationship between the self and
external reality. This perspective is known as the social constructivist
perspective. “Social constructionists argue for a merge view of `the
person’ and `their social context’ where the boundaries of one
cannot easily be separated from the boundaries of the other”
(Stevens 1996, p. 222).
Social constructivists argue that the self should not be seen as a
static entity that stays constant through and through. Rather, the
self has to be seen as somethings that is in unceasing flux, in
constant struggle with external reality, and is malleable in its
dealings with society. The self is always in participation with social
life and its identity subjected to influences here and there. Having
these perspectives considered should draw one into concluding that
the self is truly multifaceted.
 THE SELF and CULTURE
Remaining the same person and turning chameleon by
adopting to one’s context seems paradoxical. However, the
French anthropologist Marcel Mauss has an explanation for
this phenomenon. According to Mauss, every self has two
faces: personne and moi. Moi refers to a person’s sense of
who he is, his body, and his basic identity; his biological
givenness. Moi is a person’s basic identity. Personne, on the
other hand, is composed of the social concepts of what it
means to be who he is. Personne has much to do with what
it means to live in a particular institution, a particular
family, a particular religion, a particular nationality and how
to behave given the expectations and influences from
others.
Examples:
1. A Filipino OFW adjusting to a life in another
country.
2. Men easily transform into sweet, docile guys
when trying to woo and court a particular
woman.
3. Filipinos tend to consider their territory as a
part of who they are.
 Language is another interesting aspect of social constructivism.
The Filipino language is incredibly very interesting to talk about. The
way by which we articulate our love is denoted by the phrase,
“Mahal kita”. This of course is the Filipino version of “I love you”. The
Filipino brand of this articulation of love, unlike the English version,
does not specify the subject and the object of love. Unlike in its
English version, there is no specification of who loves and who is
loved. There is simply a word for love, mahal, and the pronoun kita
which is a 2nd person pronoun that refers to the speaker and the one
being talked to. In the Filipino language, unlike in English, there is no
distinction between the lover and the beloved. They are one.
Interesting too is the word mahal. In Filipino, the word can mean
both “love” and “expensive”. In our language, love is intimately
bound with value, with being expensive and being precious.
Something expensive is valuable. Someone we love is valuable to us.
The Sanskrit origin of the word love is “lubh” which means desire.
Technically, love is a desire. The Filipino word for it has another
intonation apart from mere desire, which is valuable.
 Another interesting facet or our language is its
being gender-neutral. In English, Spanish, and
other languages, there is a clear distinction
between a third person male and the third person
female pronoun. He and She. El and Ella. In
Filipino, it is plain “siya”. There is no specification
of gender. Our language does not specify between
male and female. We both call it “siya”.
 THE SELF and the DEVELOPMENT of the
SOCIAL WORLD
More than a person’s givenness (personality,
tendencies, propensities, etc.), one is believed to be in
active participation of shaping the self. Most often, we think
human persons are just passive actors in the whole process
of the shaping of selves. That men and women are born
with particularities that they can no longer change. Recent
studies, however, indicate that men and women in their
growth and development engage actively in the shaping of
the self. The unending terrain of metamorphosis of the self
is mediated by language. “Language as both a publicly
shared and privately utilized symbol system is the site
where the individual and the social make and remake
other” (Schwartz, White, and Luts 1993, p. 83).
 MEAD and VYGOTSKY
For Mead and Vygotsky, human persons develop with the use of
language acquisition and interaction with others. The way that we
process information is normally a form of an internal dialogue in our
head. Those who deliberate about moral dilemmas undergo this
internal dialogue. “Should I do this or that?” “But if I do this, it will be
like this”. “Don’t I want the other option?” so cognitive and
emotional development of a child is always a mimicry of how it is
done in the social world, in the external reality where he is in.
Both Vygotsky and Mead treat the human mind as something
that is made, constituted through language as experienced in the
external world and as encountered in dialogues with others. A young
child internalizes values, norms, practices, and social beliefs and
mores through exposure to these dialogues that will eventually
become part of his individual world. For Mead, this takes place as a
child assumes the `other’ through language and role play
 For Mead, this takes place as a child assumes the `other’
through language and role play. A child conceptualizes his
notion of `self’ though this. Notice how little children are fond
of playing role play with their toys? Notice how they make
scripts and dialogues for their toys as they play with them?
According to Mead, it is through this that a child delineates
the “I” from the rest. Vygotsky, for his part believes a child
internalizes real-life dialogues that he has had with others,
with his family, his primary caregiver, or his playmates. They
apply this to their mental and practical problems along with
he social and cultural infusions brought about by the said
dialogues. Notice how children eventually become what they
watch? Notice how can easily adopt ways of cartoon
characters they are exposed to? Dora, for example?
 SELF in FAMILIES
Apart from the anthropological and psychological basis for the
relationship between the self and the social world, the sociological
likewise struggled to understand the real connection between the
two concepts. In doing so, sociologists focus on the different
institutions and powers at play in the society. Among theses, the
most prominent is in the family.
While every child is born with certain givenness, disposition
coming from his parents’ genes and general condition of life, the
impact of family is still deemed as a given in understanding the self.
The kind of family that we are born in and the resources available
to us (human, spiritual, economic) will certainly affect us and the
kind of development that we will have as we go through life. As aa
matter of evolutionary fact, human persons are one of those beings
whose importance of family cannot be denied.
Human beings are born virtually helpless and the
dependency period of a human baby to its parent for
nurturing is relatively loner than most of other animals.
Learning, therefore, is critical in our capacity to actualize
our potential of becoming human. In trying to achieve the
goal of becoming a fully realized human, a child enters a
system of relationships, most important of which is the
family.’
Human persons learn the ways of living and therefore
their selfhood by being in a family. It is what a family
initiates a person to become that serves as a basis for this
person’s progress. Babies internalize ways and styles that
they view from their family. For example, by imitating the
language of their primary agents of rearing, their family,
babies learn their language. The same is true
 for ways of behaving. Notice how kids reared in a
respectful environment becomes respectful as well and the
converse if raised in a converse family. Internalizing behavior
may either be conscious or unconscious. Table manners or
ways of speaking to elders are things that are possible to
teach and therefore, are consciously learned by kids. Some
behaviors and attitudes, on the other hand, may be
indirectly taught through rewards and punishments. Others
such as sexual behavior or how to confront emotions are
learned to subtle means, like the tone of the voice or
intonation of the models. It is then clear at this point that
those who develop and eventually grow to become adult
who still did not learn simple matters like basic manners of
conduct failed in internalizing due to parental or familial
failure to initiate them into the world.
 GENDER and the SELF
Another important aspect of the self that is important
to mention here is gender. Gender is one of those loci of
the self that is subject to alteration, change, and
development. We have seen in the past years how people
fought hard for the right to express, validate, and assert
their gender expression. Many conservatives may frown
upon this and insist on the biological. However, form the
point-of-view of the social sciences and the self, it is
important to give one the leeway to find, express, and live
his identity. This forms part of selfhood that one cannot just
dismiss. One maneuvers into the society and identifies
himself as who he is by also taking note of gender
identities. A wonderful anecdote about Leo Tolstoy’s wife
that can solidify this point is narrated below:
 Sonia Tolstoy, the wife of the famous Russian novelist Leo
Tolstoy, wrote when she was twenty-one, “I am nothing but
a miserable crushed worm, whom no one wants, whom no
one loves, a useless creature with morning sickness, and a
big belly, two rotten teeth, and a bad temper, a battered
sense of dignity, and a love which nobody wants and which
nearly drives me insane.” a few yeares late she wrote, “it
makes me laugh to read over this diary. It’s so full of
contradictions, and one would think that I was such an
unhappy woman. Yet is there a happier woman than I?”
(Moffat and Painter 1974).
 This account illustrates that our gender partly determines how
we see ourselves in the world. Oftentimes, society forces a
particular identity unto us depending on our sex and/or gender. In
the Philippines, husbands for the most part are expected to
provide for the family. Rthe eldest man in a family is expected to
head the family and hold it in. slight modifications have been on
the way due to feminism and LGBT activism but for the most part,
patriarchy was remained to be at work.
Nancy Chodorow, feminist, argues that because mothers take
the role of taking care of children, there is a tendency for girls to
imitate the same and reproduce the same kind of mentality as
women as care providers in the family. The way that little girls are
given dolls instead of dolls, encouraged to play with makeshift
kitchen also reinforces notion of what roles they should take and
the selves they would develop. In boarding schools for girls, young
women are encouraged to act like fine ladies, are trained to
behave in a fashion that befits their status as women in society.
 Men on the other hand, in the periphery of their own
family, are taught early on how to behave like a man. This
normally includes holding in one’s emotion, being tough,
fatalistic, not to worry about danger, and admiration for hard
physical labor. Masculinity is learned by integrating a young
boy in a society. In the Philippines, young boys had to undergo
circumcision not just for the original, clinical purpose of
hygiene but to also assert their manliness in the society.
Circumcision plays another social role by initiating young boys
into manhood.
The gendered self is then shaped within a particular
context of time and space. The sense of self that is being
taught makes sure that an individual fits in a particular
environment. This is dangerous and detrimental in the goal of
truly finding one’s self, self determination, and growth of the
self. Gender has to personally discovered and asserted and
not dictated by culture and the society.