UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

Week 1 : Philosophical Perspectives

Socrates (470-399 BCE) is remembered for his teaching methods and for asking thought-provoking questions.

“I do not think that I know what I do not know.”

In the context of this quote, Socrates is explaining that he does not claim to possess the knowledge of artisans or
scholars on subjects he has not studied, that he bears no false pretense to understanding those. In another quote on the
same topic of expertise, Socrates once said, "I know very well that I possess no knowledge worth speaking of" on the
topic of building a home.

● Know Thyself
● Question Everything
● Only the Pursuit of Goodness Bring Happiness
● Socratic Method

Plato (429-347 BCE) notion of happiness in Greek philosophy applies arete-"virtue" or "excellence"-

● Anything that has a characteristic use, function, or activity has a virtue or excellence
● The excellence of a race horse is whatever enables it to run well; the excellence of a knife is whatever enables
it to cut well

Tripartite Soul

● The Rational part desires to exert reason and attain rational decisions (RULING CLASS)
● The Spirited part desires supreme honor (MILITARY CLASS)
● The Appetite part of the soul desires bodily pleasures such as food, drink, sex, etc. (COMMONER)

Aristotle's claim to be the founder of logic rests primarily on the Prior Analytics

All men are mortal Major premise

Jose is a man Minor premise
Ergo, (therefore) Jose is mortal Conclusion

● Contributed the foundation of both symbolic logic and scientific thinking

● The best way to gain knowledge was through "natural philosophy," which is what we would now call science.
● Happiness, which is dependent in an individual's virtues, is the central purpose of human life and a goal in
itself

St. Augustine
"The truth is like a lion. You don't have to defend it. Let it loose. It will defend itself"

● An important figure in the development of Western Christianity

● His philosophy of man brings together the wisdom of Greek philosophy and the divine truths contained in the
scripture.
● The absolute and immutable is the Living God, the Creator of the entire universe.
● To love God means to love one's fellow man, and to love one's fellow man means never to do any harm to
another.

Rene Descartes (1596-1650)

“Dubito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum.” I doubt therefore I think, I think therefore I am

● The Self is defined as a subject that thinks.

● The self that has full competence in the powers of human reason.
● Having distanced the self from all sources of truth from authority and tradition, the self can only find its truth
and authenticity within its own capacity to think.
John Locke (1632-1704)
"No man's knowledge here can go beyond his experience."

● Personal identity is a matter of psychological continuity.

● Personal identity (or the self) is founded on consciousness.
● Identity over time is fixed by awareness of the past.

Locke posits an "empty" mind, a tabula rasa, which is shaped by experience, and sensations and reflections being the
two sources of all our ideas.

David Hume
"A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence."

If we examine these basic data of our experience, we see that they form a fleeting stream of sensations in our mind and
that nowhere among them is the sensation of a "constant and invariable" self that exists as a unified identity over the
course of our lives. And because the self is not to be found among these continually changing sensations, we can only
conclude that there is no good reason for believing that the self exists.

The nature of the self is bound up with one's reflections on one's states.

For Hume, this means that the self is nothing over and above a constantly varying bundle of experiences.

For Locke, it means that the self is defined by what we do or, perhaps, can self-attribute, through recollection and/or
appropriation.

Immanuel Kant
"To be is to do."

● Consciousness is the central feature of the self.

● The consciousness is divided into:
Internal Self - is composed of psychological states and informed decisions; remembering our own
state, how can we combine the new and old ideas with our mind
External Self - made up of ourselves and the physical world where the representation of objects

Sigmund Freud
"The child is the father of man."

● The self continues from childhood to adulthood

● Personality is determined by childhood experiences
● Personality is largely unconscious

Structure of the Self

- Id: animalistic self; pleasure principle
- Ego: executive self; reality principle
- Superego: conscience; morality principle

Gilbert Ryle

● Rejects the theory that mental states are separable from physical states.
● He concluded that adequate descriptions of human behaviour need never refer to anything but the operations
of human bodies
● His form of Philosophical Behaviourism (the belief that all mental phenomena can be explained by reference
to publicly observable behaviour) became a standard view for several decades.
● He argued that philosophers do not need a "hidden" principle to explain the supra mechanical capacities of
humans, because the workings of the mind are not distinct from the actions of the body, but are one and the
same.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
"We know not through our intellect but through our experience."

● His work is commonly associated with the philosophical movement called existentialism and its intention to
begin with an analysis of the concrete experiences, perceptions, and difficulties of human existence.
● Consciousness, the world, and the human body as a perceiving thing are intricately intertwined and mutually
"engaged".
● Our perception of the self is a collection of our perceptions of our outside world.

Week 2 : Sociological Perspectives

The Basic Insights of Sociology ; the basic understanding of sociology is that human behavior is shaped by the groups
to which people belong and by the social interaction that takes place within those groups.

We are who we are and we behave the way we do because we happen to live in a particular society at a particular point
in space and time. People tend to accept their social world unquestioningly, as something "natural." But the
sociological perspective enables us to see society as a temporary social product, created by human beings and capable
of being changed by them as well.

George Herbert Mead - Social Behaviorism ; explains how social experience develops an individual's personality.
Mead's central concept is the self; the part of an individual's personality composed of self- awareness and self-image.

The Self
● A dimension of personality that is made-up of the individual's self awareness and self image.
● According to Mead, the self cannot be separated from the society.

George Herbert Mead suggested that the self develops through a three-stage role-taking process These stages include
the preparatory stage, play stage, and game stage.

1. The Preparatory Stage.

At this stage, children's behavior are primarily based on imitation. The preparatory stage lasts from the time
we are born until we are about age two. In this stage, children mimic those around them. This is why parents of young
children typically do not want you to use foul language around them.

2. The Play Stage.

Children are said to be in the play stage from around age 2 to 6. During this stage, children play pretend as the
significant other and don't stick to the rules in organized games such as freeze tag or soccer. It is much easier to simply
go with any rules during the time of the game than attempting to enforce any rules upon them. It means when these
children play house, they are usually pretending to be the mom or the dad that they know.

3. The Game Stage.

The third stage is the game stage, which is from about age seven onwards. In this stage, children can begin to
understand and adhere to the rules of games. They can begin to play more formalized games because they begin to
understand other people's perspective-or the perspective of the generalized other.
Two Parts of Self

1. I Self. The part of the self which functions as the subject of a social action.
2. Me Self. The part of the self that functions as an object.

THE SELF: I and Me

I - the spontaneous, driving force that fosters all that is novel, unpredictable, and unorganized in the self
Me - the objective self; the image of self seen when one takes the role of the other

Charles Horton Cooley - Symbolic Interactionist Perspective (August 17, 1864 - May 7, 1929)

Cooley stated that to understand behavior, we must first understand the meanings humans attach to certain situations
and, thus, the behavior that is taught to go along with that situation. He believed that societies shape the lives of the
people who live within them.

In symbolic interactionism, the meanings attached to symbols are socially created and fluid, instead of natural and
static. Because of this, we act and react to symbols based on their current assigned meanings. Both masculinity and
femininity are performed gender identities, in the sense that gender is something we do or perform, not something we
are.

Charles H. Cooley - Looking Glass Self Theory (1902)

In this theory, Cooley argued that an individual's perception of himself or herself is based primarily on how society
views him or her.

Looking-glass Self
1.People imagine how they present themselves to others.
2. People imagine how others evaluate them.
3. People develop feelings about themselves as a result of these impressions.
C. Wright Mills (1916-1962) - Sociological Imagination
Provides a framework for understanding our social world that far surpasses any common sense notion we might derive
from our limited social experiences.

Sociological imagination enables you to look at your life and your own personal issues and relate them to other
people, history, or societal.

Personal troubles are private problems experienced within the character of the individual and the range of their
immediate relation to others. Mills identified that we function in our personal lives as actors and actresses who make
choices about our friends, family, groups, work, school, and other issues within our control. We have a degree of
influence on the outcome of matters within this personal level. A college student who rarely attends online classes, and
who never does his class activities has a personal trouble that interferes with his odds of success in college.

However, when 44,069 Philippines college students of state universities and colleges (SUCS) did not enroll for
academic year 2020-2021 as the country deals with the COVID-19 pandemic, we look at it as a larger social issue.

Larger social or public issues are those that lie beyond one's personal control and the range of one's inner life. These
pertain to broader matters of organization and process, which are rooted in society rather than in the individual.

Nationwide, students come to college as freshmen who are often ill-prepared to understand the rigors of university or
college life. They haven't often been challenged enough in high school to make the necessary adjustments required to
succeed in university

The average teenager spends many hours in social media, text messages, surfs the Net, plays video games, streams
movies, spends hours each day with friends, and works at least part-time. Where and when would he or she get
experience focusing attention on college studies and the rigorous self- discipline required to transition into college?

A majority of personal problems are not experienced as exclusively personal issues, but are influenced and affected by
social norms, habits, cultures, social and personal and expectations. Issues like : Homelessness, Drug crime, Teenage
pregnancy, Unemployment, Marriage separation.

For example, homelessness may be blamed on the individuals who are living on the streets. Perhaps their personal
choices influenced their position; some would say they are lazy, unmotivated, or uneducated. This approach of
blaming the victim fails to account for the societal factors that also lead to homelessness-what types of social obstacles
and social failings might push someone towards homelessness? Bad schools, high unemployment, high housing costs,
and little family support are all social issues that could contribute to homelessness.
Week 3 : Anthropological Perspectives

What is a culture?
"that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, customs, and any other capabilities
and habits acquired by man as a member of society."

Urie Bronfenbrenner - Ecological Theory

The Five Ecological Systems

Bronfenbrenner (1977) suggested that the environment of the child is a nested arrangement of structures, each
contained within the next. He organized them in order of how much of an impact they have on a child.microsystem,
mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem and the chronosystem.

The Microsystem
The first level of Bronfenbrenner's theory, and are the things that have direct contact with the child in their
immediate environment, such as parents, siblings, teachers and school peers. Relationships in a microsystem are
bi-directional, meaning the child can be influenced by other people in their environment and is also capable of
changing the beliefs and actions of other people too. The interactions within microsystems are often very personal and
are crucial for fostering and supporting the child's development.

The Mesosystem
Encompasses the interactions between the child's microsystems, such as the interactions between the child's
parents and teachers, or between school peers and siblings. The mesosystem is where a person's individual
microsystems do not function independently, but are interconnected and assert influence upon one another.

The Macrosystem
Is a component of Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory that focuses on how cultural elements affect a
child's development, such as socioeconomic status, wealth, poverty, and ethnicity. Thus, culture that individuals are
immersed within may influence their beliefs and perceptions about events that transpire in life. The macrosystem
differs from the previous ecosystems as it does not refer to the specific environments of one developing child, but the
already established society and culture which the child is developing in. This can also include the socioeconomic
status, ethnicity, geographic location and ideologies of the culture.

The Chronosystem
The fifth and final level of Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory is known as the chronosystem. This
system consists of all of the environmental changes that occur over the lifetime which influence development,
including major life transitions, and historical events. These can include normal life transitions such as starting school
but can also include non-normative life transitions such as parents getting a divorce or having to move to a new house.

Anthropology is a field of social sciences that focuses on the study of humans and human behavior and societies in
the past and present.

Cultural Anthropology
Cultural Anthropologists are interested in knowing what makes one's group's manner of living particular to
that group and forms an essential part of the member's personal and social identity.

The Self from the Perspective of Anthropology

WELCOME TO THE 21st CENTURY

Where sex is free love is costly. Losing a mobile is painful than losing virginity.
Where boys flirts & pass bad comments to other girls but can't see if a boy doing this wit her sister.
Where bathrooms became photo studios.
Where getting an iPhone is greater than achieving graduation.
Where if you don't cheat on your partner you are not sharp and smarter.
Where temples turned into dating points & worship became difficult.
Where lies are turned into realities.

Where ladies fear for pregnancy rather than HIV.

Where pizza delivery is faster than emergency. People fear for theives & terrorist rather than god.
Where people go to temple/church/masid with phone and charger rather than BhagawatGeeta/Bible/Quran.
Where out look and clothes decides the value of a person.
Where money is more important than family and friends.
Where guys scared of getting married but love to have sex.
Where couples doesn't care about the true essence of marriage.

Thomas Csordas:
“A phenomenic body that perceives and expresses an array of feelings and meanings within itself."

"The body is the existential base of culture, given that its diverse means of being are culturally constructed even as the
body itself produces particular sensations. The way in which we treat and use our bodies, and indeed the very
possibility of using them, are neither arbitrary nor biologically determined: instead,

- TV networks contribute in shaping our beliefs, political ideologies, and viewpoints thereby creating an
individual among us.
- Television influences the language, traditions, beliefs, knowledge, and even personalities.
- The print media is also shaping us in many different ways.
- Radio also has a big influence

Clifford Geertz (1926-2006)

American Anthropologist. He provided an understanding and acknowledgement of "thick description" that
exists within cultures:

Thick Description - understanding other people's understanding of things.

Culture is “an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a system of inherited conceptions
expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about
and their attitudes toward life" (Geertz 1973).

Thick Description
- involves writing detailed narratives or 'vignettes' explaining situations and their background 'context'.
- the goal is not just to describe a situation, but also add details so that readers understand the significant and
complex cultural meanings underpinning any observable scenario
- refers to the researcher's task of both describing and understand the significant and complex cultural meanings
underpinning an observable scenario

Week 4 : Psychological Perspectives

The Self
- a person's essential being that distinguishes them from others, especially considered as the object of
introspection or reflexive action.
- the set of someone's characteristics, such as personality and ability, that are not physical and make that person
different from other people:

What is the self? Answer: It depends.

William James
- Self is the essence of a person: his thoughts, feelings and actions, experiences, beliefs, values, principles and
relationships.
- "ME" Self refers to the aspects of someone that come from that person's experiences
- ''I” Self classified as the thinking self
- The Me-self and I-self creates one cohesive self.

4 Sub-sections of the Me-self

1. The Material Self 3. The Spiritual Self

2. The Social Self 4. Pure Ego

Material self
- It consists of things that belong to us or that we belong to. Things like family, clothes, our body, and money
are some of what makes up our material selves.
Social self
- This is the self in a given social situation. For James, people change how they act depending on the social
situation that they are in. People had as many social selves as many as the social situations they participated
in.
Spiritual self
- our subjective and most intimate self.
- It includes one's personality, core values, and conscience that do not typically change throughout their
lifetime.
- It is more concrete or permanent than the other two selves.
Pure Ego
- is the "most puzzling aspect of the self,"
- This is the subcategory of the self that is capable of recognizing its own thoughts.
- It is the self that synthesizes its thinking and brings all thoughts together.

"The present human world is more tightly integrated than at any earlier point in history. In the age of the jet plane and
satellite dish, the age of global capitalism, the age of universal markets and global mass media, various commentators
have claimed that the world is rapidly becoming a single place. Although this slightly exaggerated description has an
important point to make, a perhaps even more striking aspect of the post- cold war world is the emergence seemingly
everywhere - of identity politics whose explicit aim is the restoration of rooted tradition, religious fervour and/or
commitment to ethnic or national Identities" Globalization and the politics of identity Thomas Hylland Eriksen (1999)

Global self is that sub-self that is considered as the "citizen of the world"

For Carl Rogers

Real Self
- The real self and the ideal self are terms used to describe personality domains.
- The real self is who we actually are.
- It is how we think, how we feel, look, and act.
- The real self can be seen by others, but because we have no way of truly knowing how others view us, the real
self is our self-image.

Ideal Self
- The ideal self is how we want to be.
- It is an idealized image that we have developed over time, based on what we have learned and experienced.
- The ideal self could include components of what our parents have taught us, what we admire in others, what
our society promotes, and what we think is in our best interest.
 - Although it is healthy, to some extent, to have an ideal self, it can become a problem when our ideal self is too
far removed from what we really are.
- This incongruence can lead us to become demoralized and discouraged because we have in fact set ourselves
up for failure.
- It can lead to stress and anxiety because the real self never seems good enough and the ideal self seems
impossible to attain.

Donald Woods Winnicott

- For Winincott, the self is a very important part of mental and emotional well-being which plays a vital role in
creativity.
- He thought that people were born without a clearly developed self and had to "search" for an authentic sense
of self as they grew.

Multiple Self
- The self that resides in the dimension of the mental and cultural and is not really reducible to the physical and
biological.

Three Domains
1 The Experiential Self
- This is the 'theater of consciousness' and the first person felt the experience of being.
- It includes the felt periods of time. In that sense, consistency of being across it is tied very closely to memory.
2. The Private Self-consciousness System
- This is called the "narrator" (or interpreter), because it is the portion of your being that verbally narrates what
is happening and why and tries to make sense of what is going on.
3. The public self or two persona
- It refers to the public image that you attempt to project others, which in turn interacts with how other people
actually see you.
- It is also the part that includes your reportable self-concept and explicit beliefs and values about the way the
world works (e.g., your religious and political beliefs)

Week 5 : Eastern Western Thoughts

Confucianism's Origins and Beliefs

- Confucius was a Chinese philosopher who lived from 551-479 B.C. who wished to be an advisor to a noble.
- Confucius taught and emphasized the importance of "correct behaviors, an art known as li.
- He traveled from region to region with a small group of students, his disciples.
- Confucianism is an ethnic religion because it focuses primarily on works.
 - Confucius believed that any perception about the afterlife was beyond human comprehension.
- Confucius also rejected the idea of "sin" but viewed mistakes as an opportunity to do better the next time.
- Their ultimate goal is to be perfect and moral.

Daoism's (Taoism) Origin and Beliefs

- Founder is believed to be Lao-Tse who is rumored to have lived from 604-531 BCE.
- Many historians argue that he could be mythical, or a mixture of many different political leaders.
- Searching for a way to avoid constant warfare and feuding during his lifetime.
- Started as a combination of psychology and philosophy.

Daoism (Taoism) Beliefs

- Be like water
- Flow smoothly around obstacles rather than bumping up against them.
- Adapt yourself to the shape of the channel and you won't get stuck.
- The natural rather than the human made world is offered as a model.

Mohism
- was an influential philosophical, social, and religious movement that flourished during the
Warring States era (479-221 BCE)in ancient Mo Di, or "Mozi" ("Master Mo," fl. ca. 430 BCE
from whom it takes its name.
- Mohism originates in the teachings of Mo Di or Mo Di (Master Mo) fl.ca. 430 BCE from whom
it takes its name.

Fa-Jia or Legalism
- Is one of the six classical schools of thought in Chinese philosophy that developed during the Warring States
period.
- Largely ignoring morality or questions on how a society ideally should function, they examined contemporary
government, emphasizing a realistic consolidation of the wealth and power of the autocrat and state, with the
goal of achieving increased order, security and stability.

Buddhism
- Is an Indian religion and dharma that encompasses a variety of traditions, beliefs and spiritual practices largely
based on teachings attributed to the Buddha.
- Two major extant branches of Buddhism are generally recognized by scholars: Theravada (Pali: "The School
of the Elders") and Mahayana (Sanskrit: "The Great Vehicle").
Noble Eightfold Path
1. The right view
2. The right intention
3. The right speech
4. The right action
5. The right livelihood
6. The right effort
7. The right mindfulness
8. The right concentration

Individualistic Self (The Western Thought)

- The individual identifies primarily with self, with the needs of the individual being satisfied before those of
the group. Looking after and taking care of oneself, being self-sufficient, guarantees the well-being of the
group.
- Individualism states that each individual is acting on his or her own, making their own choices, and to the
extent they interact with the rest of the group.
- Independence and self- reliance are greatly stressed and valued. In general, people tend to distance themselves
psychologically and emotionally from each other. One may choose to join groups, but group membership is
not essential to one's identity or success.
- Collectivism views the group as primary entity, with the individuals lost along the way
- The survival and success of the group ensures the well-being of the individuals, so that by considering the
needs and feelings of others, one protects oneself.
- Weaknesses : Both collectivist and individualistic cultures have their failings. People in individualist cultures
are susceptible in loneliness, and people in collectivist cultures can have a strong fear of rejection

Traits of Individualism (Western Thoughts)

- "I" identity, promotes individual goals, initiative and achievement.
- Individual rights are seen as being the most important. Rules attempt to ensure self-importance and
individualism.
- Independence is valued; there is much less of a drive to help other citizens or communities than in
collectivism.
- Relying or being dependent on others is frequently seen as shameful. People are encouraged to do things on
their own; to rely on themselves. People strive for their own successes
- Examples of Countries with Generally Individualistic Cultures : United States, Italy, Australia, Belgium,
United Kingdom, Sweden, Canada, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway Hungary (post-communist generation),
Switzerland, Germany, New Zealand

Traits of Collectivism (Eastern Thoughts)

- Each person is encouraged to be an active player in society, to do what is best for society as a whole rather
than themselves.
- The rights of families, communities, and the collective supersede those of the individual.
- Rules promote unity, brotherhood, and selflessness.
- Working with others and cooperating is the norm; everyone supports each other.
- as a community, family or nation more than as an individual
- Examples of Countries with Generally Collectivistic Cultures : China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Egypt, India,
Cyprus, Pakistan, Ghana, Bangladesh, Nepal, Indonesia, Argentina, Afghanistan, Armenia