Identity and Conflict

Video Transcription

Hi, I'm Julie Tietz, and welcome to conflict resolution-- putting the pieces together. Today we're going to talk about identity and conflict.

And for our key terms, we have identity, which is a person's sense of self, the way an individual defines himself or herself. In-group-- the group which a given person defines herself or himself as a member of. Out-group-- the group in which a given person does not define himself or herself as a member.

So when we're talking about identity, it's important to remember that it's how we define our sense of self. And that makes up our perspectives, attitudes, evaluations, and actions in our everyday life. So our identity is constructed by a number of different factors, such as our own personal experiences, our gender or our beliefs about gender, the groups that we are members of, roles that are assigned or derived from our culture, and also relationships and input that we receive from others.

So our identity predisposes us to act or perceive in certain ways in various situations, including when we are in conflict. Identity is a major source of conflict.

So along with our sense of self, we often find ourselves identifying with specific groups that have similar identities of our own. And this is known as the in-group. And on the other side, there is the out-group, and these are the members that are not identifying with our group. So anybody that is not like us is part of the out-group.

So our identity may also contribute to negative assumptions that we might have about others that are not in our identity group. And this in-group/out-group separation can lead to conflict.

Looking at this in-group and out-group separation and conflict, let's look on a small scale. Let's say, it involves dogs versus cats.

You love dogs, and you think that cats are really disgusting. And you think that people who own cats are really bad. And you can't believe that they would own such a gross animal. And you think that people who own dogs must be really good people because they're caring for other animals, and they're sociable, or whatever the feelings are.

And your negative thoughts about the people who own cats create this out-group, and your positive assumptions about dogs and people own dogs create the in-group. So this distinction between the in-group and out-group, you're choosing not to socialize with cat people based solely on the fact that they own a cat. And you don't take it a step further to get to know them. And you may make snide comments about cat people, and somebody may overhear you and start a conflict or an altercation about dogs versus cats.

On a larger scale conflict with in-group and out-group would be the Holocaust. So Hitler believed that the Aryan race was the most superior. And he created an in-group of people who looked and identified as Aryan race. And he made negative assumptions towards the Jewish people and other people that were not like the Aryan race and created the out-group. And these negative assumptions about the people in the out-group led to genocide and really atrocious human rights violations. So you can see how these negative assumptions can lead to really terrifying outcomes and conflict.

So now let's cover the key points of our lesson on identity and conflict. Our identity makes up who we are as a person. And our identity is constructed through a variety of factors in our life. And our identity forms in-groups with those who identify the same as us and out-groups to those who don't have the same identity as us.

So our sense of self can create negative assumptions about others, and these assumptions can predispose us to conflict. It's important to be aware of how we identify and how that can contribute to negative assumptions. In doing so, we can possibly prevent conflicts in the future.

Thank you for taking the time to watch this tutorial, and I hope to catch you, again, next time.