Human Identity and Society

George Herbert Mead, Peter Berger, and Thomas Luckmann all believed that a human being's identity is forged from the interactions they have with society. Mead drew a fundamental distinction between the self, which was a person's body and was capable of a limited form of physical intelligence, and the I and the Me that form a person's psychic identity. The I and the Me, in turn, were the dichotomy between an individual's sense of their own identity and the same individual's conception of their interactions with society. It was in this interaction between the I and the Me, between the individual and society, that identity is forged and actions take meaning, according to Mead. Berger and Luckmann advance a similar idea, namely that man has no real sense of self without society. According to Berger and Luckmann, men cannot exist in a vacuum, and without interactions with other human beings their lives have no meaning.

Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, in their essay entitled "Society as a Human Product," expound their belief that the self is entirely wrapped up in society. According to Berger and Luckmann

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Category: Psychology - H