Identity

I'm feeling reflective. So I'm going to reflect. Bear with me.

In the United States we're all wrapped up in our own identities. We're implored to ask ourselves "Who am I?" Well, that's easy. I'm a singer, an actress, a sister, daughter, ally, friend, girlfriend, woman, human...the list goes on. But when people think of me, more often than not, I am "the singer." This, by the way, is proven by those pictures that were really popular on facebook 6 months ago, and on every single one of them I was labelled "the singer", save the pokemon one which didn't have "the singer" as an option. Since I got here I feel like I can't hide behind that identity. Yes, I joined the choir, but that doesn't mean anything here. And honestly being a singer, a musician, is a huge part of the overall way I present myself.

Meanwhile I'm in an ethnomusicology class, and I'm finally learning how to transcribe. I've wanted to learn for so long, and have felt so overwhelmed by it that I just never taught myself. Now, here I am, finally honing some skills and realizing that I have a better ear than some of the kids who have taken the class for a semester already. I feel like it is a gift to myself; a gift to my own identity. But while I'm here no one cares how I identify; so it feels like for the first time I am doing something truly for myself. I don't necessarily have to transcribe anything for anyone else when I go home, or I could come back to UpTop with a few songs jotted down to learn. It could go either way but even then I probably wouldn't get credit for arranging a song so it doesn't affect who I am. Most casual listeners don't really care who arranged what, anyway (which is stupid because arranging a song takes a LOT of time).

Anyway, I digressed. I guess what I'm trying to say is maybe we would be better served with not being so involved in how we identify all the time. By constantly putting labels on ourselves we are requiring ourselves to play up those characteristics which embody those labels. I guess what I'm trying to say is that these identities, these labels, are social facts. The fact that I am a woman affects me every moment that I'm here. But I don't feel the pressure of the social fact, that is I don't feel the need to be particularly feminine, or especially polite or softspoken, or feed into any of the other characteristics which are thrust upon women. I feel like this is the goal South Africa as a country strives to reach. The entire South African population was held prisoners by the confines of social labels throughout the 20th century. Now that these labels are "illegal" people are free to act for themselves instead of embodying the labels they were assigned. Isn't that truly what a free society is? My friend here may be gay, but he doesn't have to reaffirm that identity all the time to be acknowledged by that community. So he can act however he wants to, instead of however society decides he should act.

This is all very liberating. I mean I felt this way last year, especially during RA training. But now that I can experience a life without some of the labels, I feel like I have more space to run around. I mean, I've still got "AMERICAN" stamped on my forehead, but I can handle that. That one's hard to avoid. I wonder how I'll feel when I go back to America and I'm slapped back into the "White, Liberal, Female, Woman, Heterosexual, Singer" box.