Negotiating Multiplicity: Adaptive Asymmetries within Second-Generation Turks’ “Society of Mind”

Abstract

If identities are socially produced, what happens when individuals grow up participating in divergent or conflicting social contexts? This paper reports upon research with second generation Turkish adolescents in London. Using the concept of the dialogical self, the research examines the dialogical structure of these young Turks’ selves. The analysis is Bakhtinian and seeks to identify the different discourses through which these young Turks talk about themselves. Three distinct discourses, or I-positions, are identified. These are then related to the sociocultural context within which these youth live, and specific attention is given to the constraints upon these youth in expressing aspects of their identity. We demonstrate that the asymmetries and tensions within these adolescents’ dialogical selves are adaptive to the fractured and asymmetrical social contexts in which they are embedded.