2008 Woodie Awards
Constructing or deconstructing an identity
Adrian Shanker
Issue date: 2/7/08 Section: Op/Ed
Often in this column, I discuss issues specific to gender and the queer experience, but for at least this article, I will take a break from gender and focus on a larger identity question.
When prospective students visit Muhlenberg, what are they looking for in the current student body? Are they looking for intelligence? Worldly consciousness? Civic participation? Physical attractiveness? Healthy bodies? What is the "Muhlenberg identity" they are looking to see if they fit into? And do we have a so-called Muhlenberg identity? Is that even possible, to have a unified identity for a student body of over two thousand strong? I often wonder how outsiders generalize "Muhlenberg students" and how it relates to our identity, both self-defined and thrust upon us.
Often thrown around are catch phrases such as the "Caring College" - a great compliment to the college as a whole, and students involved with Community Service programming in particular, but does that message infuse itself within the individual identities of Muhlenberg students? When asking students on campus if they thought there was a Muhlenberg identity, I was told, that of course there is no such identity, that we are all individuals and we are a campus of infinite identities - but when speaking with outsiders, there is a clear Muhlenberg stereotype: wealthy, white, New Jersey, politically apathetic, and uninterested in Allentown.
Many on campus would be offended by the false stereotypes of 'Berg students, but with little desire among many students to deconstruct the stereotypes, we are forced into a box with those words as they become our identity.
The images of the College as an all-white, upper class, student body from New Jersey is simply not true, and while we are statistically over 90% white, and over 30% from New Jersey, our identities are certainly not monolithic. With the Multicultural Center thriving, and the amount of out-LGBT students growing, we are certainly more diverse than representing every county in New Jersey (maybe twice?)…
When prospective students visit Muhlenberg, what are they looking for in the current student body? Are they looking for intelligence? Worldly consciousness? Civic participation? Physical attractiveness? Healthy bodies? What is the "Muhlenberg identity" they are looking to see if they fit into? And do we have a so-called Muhlenberg identity? Is that even possible, to have a unified identity for a student body of over two thousand strong? I often wonder how outsiders generalize "Muhlenberg students" and how it relates to our identity, both self-defined and thrust upon us.
Often thrown around are catch phrases such as the "Caring College" - a great compliment to the college as a whole, and students involved with Community Service programming in particular, but does that message infuse itself within the individual identities of Muhlenberg students? When asking students on campus if they thought there was a Muhlenberg identity, I was told, that of course there is no such identity, that we are all individuals and we are a campus of infinite identities - but when speaking with outsiders, there is a clear Muhlenberg stereotype: wealthy, white, New Jersey, politically apathetic, and uninterested in Allentown.
Many on campus would be offended by the false stereotypes of 'Berg students, but with little desire among many students to deconstruct the stereotypes, we are forced into a box with those words as they become our identity.
The images of the College as an all-white, upper class, student body from New Jersey is simply not true, and while we are statistically over 90% white, and over 30% from New Jersey, our identities are certainly not monolithic. With the Multicultural Center thriving, and the amount of out-LGBT students growing, we are certainly more diverse than representing every county in New Jersey (maybe twice?)…