Daquan Adams

Identity Crisis

            . What are these factors that make up an identity? How important is an identity is to someone? Identity is what we as people use to identify ourselves as unique and different from other people. Identity is made of many small factors that combine to make the overall person that people identify you as. I am proud to have my own identity that no one can copy. Whether it be my race and personality and the way I see people. I am me and only I can be me, no one else can be the person that I am.

            My race plays a big part of my identity to help shape me. I am proud to be black and being part of a group of people that are rich with soul and feeling. Like in hip hop planet it shows that we can evolve to match the feeling of our people. “Imagine a burning man. He is on fire. He runs into the room. You put out the flames. Then another burning man arrives. You put him out and go about your business. Then two, three, four, five, ten appear. You extinguish them all, send them to the hospital. Then imagine no one bothers to examine why the men caught fire in the first place. That is the story of hip-hop.”(James McBride, pg1) The way of expression that came out of nowhere that should the many identities of people trying to express themselves. To show the deep understand of the pain that many will never understand. I’m part of history that helps shape my identity as a person and put me in a community of people with a colorful history. The history of black people in America has and always shape my identity.

            Personality is a big part of what makes up an identity. Mainly because your personality is what you act like and what you show so that people can identify you. My personality is that I always want people to smile and laugh when they are around me. All my friends call me a big teddy bear because I never want to see them sad. That being my personality is how they see me, how they identify as. My identity of how people see me is made up of my personality. I have a personality that is all my own, making my identity unique and special in many different ways.

            People have many different identity’s that are used to recognize them. Some use race others use upbringing and some use personality. I see people that use all three to help make up themselves. My roommate uses his heritage as a Peruvian to identify himself and he is proud of it. He wants people to know where he comes from and is proud of what he is. That is his identity and that is how I see him, a proud man of heritage. He also loves to make people laugh which is his personality that also makes up who he is.

            Identity is an important in life in many ways. It is what makes us who we are, and what we are. My identity is the connection to my race and the way I want people to see me. I love to make my friends laugh and make them happy. That is how they see me as, my identity to them as the teddy bear. Identity is unique and special to everyone. We all have multiple factors that make up our identity as a whole. I’m proud that I am me and no one else can be me.

Work cited

James McBride, “Hip Hop Planet”. National Geographic Magazine. April 2007, © 2015 National Geographic Society. All rights reserved.