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others and are identified by them in turn, in the internal-external dialectic
between self-image and public image.
Identities can also be perceived by those who express them as well as
those who observe them. Identities can also be conceptualised, especially
at the macro-level context (“Official Discourse”), in which certain rules and
laws are laid down to foster such kind of identities. The labelling and
categorisation of people in rigid racial and tribal lines by the past apartheid
authorities in South Africa, is an example of how identities can be
conceptualised and fostered. However, identities can be denied, especially
in cases where they are being imposed. Still on the example of apartheid
South Africa, people used to deny being identified as “non-Whites”, for
instance. The expression, observation, perception, conceptualisation and
denial of identities form an integral part of the current 20 th and 21 st centuries
debate on identities 62 .
62 R. Jenkins, Social Identity, p. 22.
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