Identity in Reverse: Exploring ‘Broken Typifications’ and Calibrating ‘Depth’ in Interpretive Inquiry with Ex-Straightedgers

Abstract

Serial elective identification has occupied a central place within Western cultural theory and social science since the commodification transformations that followed the Second World War. Yet, relatively little direct empirical attention has been paid to the possible significance of relinquished identification forms, or just how identities look when individuals reflect back upon them. In this article, I draw upon basic concepts from social phenomenology and narrative identity to indicate potentially profitable avenues for studying contemporary identification in reverse. I specifically utilize retrospective narratives gathered from 44 individuals who disaffiliated with straightedge—a clean-living, youth-oriented subculture based on strict abstinence from intoxicants in which identity is typically highly salient—to explore (1) potential forms through which identity might be accounted for that are distinct to retrospection, and (2) how subjects may uniquely account for their general life identity history looking back through a referent identity like straightedge. Interviews show ex-straightedgers reflecting upon both identity and former meaning systems they once occupied in distinctly retrospective lights, or deploying what I call broken typifications. Data likewise indicate certain dispositions toward identification, understandings of identity depth, and shifts in these can be well—if not best—accessed from hindsight in “active” interviews centered upon a substantive identity like straightedge. Ultimately, analyses indicate identity may profitably be studied in reverse in instances, which may be evermore important in a milieu where individuals are engaging and relinquishing increasing numbers of voluntary identities in their lives.