Freire And Online Classes

Individuality and Identity
  Individuality. It is what differentiates us from every single person on this planet. In the essay "The Ethics of Individuality" (2004) by Kwame Anthony Appiah, he explains how one's individuality and self identity help shape our lives. Appiah, a well known professor who received his MA and PhD from Cambridge University, tries to explain the balance between one's identity and individuality and how they affect us. He has taught at very well-known colleges including Yale, Duke, Harvard, Cornell and Princeton. Appiah references other philosophers and different texts to further prove his argument and help affirm his ideas. His essay is divided into different sections which cover the ideas of society, life choices, and more.   Understanding the context of Appiah's essay is crucial to understanding his argument because it allows us to realize the main concept of essay, individuality.
  Appiah's argument questions the labels we use to name cultural, racial, and national identity. But there are more to one's identity than just their race or nationality. Someone's identity is what they describe themselves as and how other people describe them as well. We all have our own identity and it is what makes us different from others. Appiah says, "To adopt an identity, to make it mine, is to see it as structuring my way through life. That is, my identity has patterns built into it, patterns that help me think about my life". He goes on to give an example of how one's career would eventually end with retirement. He organizes his argument by first describing an idea from a philosopher. He brings the idea of a "plan of life" and argues that a plan of life is "not like an engineer's plan". He says that we have choices that affect our lives either in short term or long term. Appiah's argument is built throughout his essay because he refers to different types of ideas in his writing.
Many of Appiah's claims are influenced by other philosopher's ideas....