“Strangers to Themselves” Identity Construction Among American Studies Students in Hungary

Abstract

This small-scale study proceeds from Bruner (1987) and Fougère (2008) in using semi-structured interviews to elicit self-narratives from six American Studies majors at two universities in Hungary. It also explores these self-narratives to ascertain (aspects of) the students’ constantly constructed identities. This is done with the understanding that identity is produced by linguistic and other semiotic practices instead of originated from them and therefore is first and foremost a socio-cultural phenomenon rather than an internal, psychological one (Bucholtz & Hall 2005). Given that language affiliation is key to identity (Simon 2004), in addition to their identities as American Studies students, the study also investigates their identities as English speakers. But what is identity? It can broadly be defined as ‘the social positioning of self and other’ (Bucholtz & Hall 2005: 586). Thus, how do these students position themselves and others? What aspects of their identity have drawn them to engage with American Studies? How have U.S. social, cultural, political, and economic phenomena – or their understanding of these phenomena – affected their sense of what it means to be an American Studies student? To what extent do their American Studies courses and the university more broadly act as a heterotopia (Foucault 1986), or third space, which enables individuals to redefine themselves through new experiences in that context? Indeed, to what extent do they develop intercultural personhood and become strangers to themselves (Kristeva 1988)?