Identity
The Bear That Wasn’t



What does the title “The Bear That Wasn’t”
mean?
Why didn’t the factory officials recognize
the Bear for what he was?
Why did it become harder and harder for
him to maintain his identity as he moved
through the bureaucracy of the factory?
The Bear That Wasn’t



What is Tashlin suggesting about the
relationship between an individual and
society?
What is he suggesting about the way a
person’s identity is defined?
How do powerful individuals and groups
shape the identity of those with less power
and authority?
The Bear That Wasn’t





Why is it so difficult for a person to go
against the group?
Have you ever experienced a similar
problem to that of the Bear?
How did you deal with it?
How did you maintain your independence?
How difficult was it to do so?
Who Am I?
German
Heritage
Senior
Freeman
Student
ME
Sister
Enjoys
Animals
Band
Member
Create an Identity Box


Using a shoebox, glue pictures and words
of how you view yourself on the inside of
the box.
On the outside of the box, paste pictures
of how others view you.
Labels and Race



How can labels be misleading?
What does the term race mean?
Imagine you apply for a copy of your birth
certificate and when you receive it, you
discover that it lists your “race” as
something other than what you and
everyone else thought it to be.
Labels and Race



This happened in 1977 to Susie GuilloryPhipps from New Orleans
She was a white woman who was defined
as black
Went 222 years back in her heritage to
discover her great-great-great-great
grandmother was black.
Religious Stereotyping



Like race, our religion is part of our identity
Religion is defined as “an organized
system of beliefs and rituals centering on
a supernatural being or beings”
All religions teach respect for individuals,
but in practicing their faith, individuals tend
to stress the differences rather than the
similarities.
Religious Stereotyping


As a result, some come to regard those
who choose to follow another religion as
suspicious, different, and dangerous.
Hatred may spread throughout the land
like the plague, so that a class, religion, a
nation will become the victim of hatred an
no one foresees the inevitable
consequences.
Tolerance



World History documents the struggle of
people to build societies that include and
protect everyone.
Why would some people object to the
word tolerate?
Respond to the following prompt: Without
tolerance, society is doomed.
Us and Them


Sometimes identity is used to exclude
people from membership in various
groups.
When we identify something as like us we
are accepting, but when classify
something as unlike us, we are dividing
the world. We use our language to
exclude, to distinguish- to discriminate.
Nations and Identity


Nations, like individuals, have an identity
What would an identity chart for the U.S.
look like?
Nationalism


Membership is very important to idea of a
nation.
Nationalism is a feeling more positive than
love for one’s country, it is a feeling of
superiority of one’s nation over other
nations.
Nationalism


By 1800’s many Europeans were defining
a nation as a people who share traditions
and a history.
Germany insisted that a common
language, history, and culture was
essential to national identity.
Nationalism

In 1810, a German nationalist wrote, “A
state without Volk is nothing, a soulless
artifice; a Volk without a state is nothing, a
bodiless airy phantom, like the Gypsies
and the Jews. Only state and Volk
together could form a Reich, and such a
Reich cannot be preserved without
Volkdom.”
Nation Building In Germany


Early 1800’s Germany was not a united
nation, but a confederacy of more than
thirty autocratic states.
War broke out in 1870 with Kaiser Wilhelm
I (William of Prussia) declaring a German
empire with Otto von Bismark as the
Chancellor, or chief advisor
Nation Building In German


Bismark and Wilhelm prepared a
Constitution that gave all German men the
right to vote.
Established the Reichstag, German
parliament, which had little authority.
A Changing World

1800’s world changed faster than ever
before



Industrial revolution
Created a rootless society where it was
easy to blame someone else for all that
was new and disturbing.
They were responsible for all of societies
ills
Who Were They?



In the Ottoman Empire, it was the
Armenians.
In the United States, they were
immigrants, African Americans and Native
Americans
In much of Europe, they were Jews.