Much can be discussed on what we mean by the words ‘preservation’ and ‘identity’, though the kind of identity whose discussion should suffice us here, should be ‘regional identity’. By regional identity, we should be meaning to something that characteristically ‘binds’ the individual to the region, i.e. Xenophobia, symptomizes an essentially prejudicially attitude, the sickest of parochial ills that equates the degradation and censure of another (identity) with the preservation of one’s identity. Identity preservation and xenophobia mustn’t go hand in hand. The erroneous understanding of ‘preservation’ as ‘compositional purity’ (as though identity were a liquid) must be done away with, for it then produces the false notion of ‘adulteration’.

Source: The Herald June 16, 2024 22:03 UTC