Iranian Identity in Words of the Youth
Author(s):
Abstract:
This essay is based on a study that sought to make sense of the perceptions of educated Iranian youth about their "Iranian identity." Unlike many writers who define Iranian identity by making reference to various readings of Iran's historical heritage and its pool of cultural, literary, linguistic, and religious traditions, this research assumes that any social identity, including national identity, is socially constructed and, as such, concentrates on the perceptions of the people themselves. In this study we tried to understand "Being Iranian" in words of the youth as a segment of the population which is considered a "strategic group" in the Iranian society both in terms of the young people's relative weight in the population and the role they will play in constructing the country's future culture. We conducted a series of semi-structured, qualitative interviews with 71 young people aged 18 to 29 who were enrolled as undergraduate students or had a university degree. A main finding of the study was that most interviewed individuals understood their Iranian identity quite differently with members of the previous generations and defined it in terms of a combination of emotional and personal values found in family relations or relations with friends along with values pertaining to development and progress of their country in the family of nations across the world.
Keywords:
Identity , Social Identity , Youth , Iran , Constructivism
Language:
Persian
Published:
Iranian Journal of Sociology, Volume:12 Issue: 1, 2011
Page:
40
https://www.magiran.com/p1036693