1.3.    What processes of re-elaboration?

A first process, universally recognized as fundamental, is identification, that is, that feeling of affirmation, belonging and valuing of the ethnic-territorial group to which the subjects belong. Indicators of this component are: pride regarding the group, the importance given to belonging and their sharing (closeness) in its cultural traditions.

Another process is exploration; that is, through research activity and evaluation of alternative possible identities, through an “immersion” of one’s culture or through activities of various kinds that lead to understanding and appreciation of one’s ethnicity. That includes both an exploration-knowledge of the characteristics of one’s group of belonging and an exploration-knowledge of characteristics of ethnic groups of non-belonging.

Then, there is another process called engagement, which considers the importance that ethnic-territorial belonging has for the elaboration of one's self-image.

Alongside these processes we cannot neglect social and cultural comparison with other groups. An essential component which functions as analysis indicator, is data from attitudes of favor or disfavor regarding relationships with persons belonging to other ethno-territorial groups.          

Another series of processes, instead, regards the methods of integration that a person adopts at the time he is inserted into a context of other cultures or is immersed more and more in the culture of his time:

*        assimilation, through which we tend to privilege the host culture over that of one’s origin; that can facilitate acculturation and integration (bi-culturalism is frequent).  According to this assumption however, the individual would tend to adapt himself to the expectations of the cultural environment into which he must be inserted. The expectation, sometimes exaggerated and “prejudicial”, that conditions most is that all “foreigners”, or at least those who come from a different culture, will forget their own belonging and culture, that they will learn to speak the language of the place and thus become like the others. The risk is that of losing all color and specificity just to “survive” the impact with other.

*        integration: if we think about society as something culturally homogeneous, as a result of the adaptation of “diverse” individuals and their changing their way of living and thinking enough to feel at ease with the lifestyle and cultural environment they are entering,  the reminder rises not to expect total abandonment of one’s own culture or  one’s ethnic identity, but to tolerate the differences between the cultures.

*        separation is another dynamic process, which is situated opposite the first two, in the sense that, on the contrary, one privileges the belonging to their original culture and therefore places himself in a position of “marginalization”. The most frequent risk for this type of process is given by the fact that the person or group closes itself in a sort of isolation which not only impoverishes, on the cultural, affective and relational levels, but can also lead to surely destructive conflicts (we against the others).

Still, we have to ask ourselves: what type of integration? What type of interaction? To avoid the risk of confusing integration with pseudo-forms of assimilation, to end up then negating it through separation, it is indispensable to find ways of integration which safeguard respect for diversity and at the same time guarantee dialog and communion. Studies and research done up to now have demonstrated, besides the interactive and dynamic character of identity, also the role of the other in  the representation of cultural identity. It is a collective specificity made up of distinctive and meaningful traits, which, however, even while preserving one’s originality, inevitably are modified and transformed in interaction. In contact with other cultures, that is, there is a reorganization of distinctive, identifying traits which is not so foreseen.  In fact, we do not always manage to take on the diversities: one could in fact refuse them, or accept them a-critically, becoming homologous.

Therefore we have to be careful, in order to avoid triggering mechanisms of projective identification or selective evaluation, to create conditions of time and space so that persons can learn a complex of rules, codes and symbols by which they can orient themselves in the “new space” and “new time”, and can build for themselves containers that are sufficiently protective and defensive of their own identity. Sometimes there is a need to discover, and at the same time, not to let oneself be known entirely (both in the young and in adults). I am referring to the impact that new generations can have with the congregation at the time of entrance or in the early phases of initial formation and insertion into a new “culture”; that is, in a new way of thinking, relating, acting, in a new lifestyle.

In the gradual experience of elaboration and re-appropriation of identity there are three references that are implicated more and that are to be safeguarded in every way: the geographic space, bodily space and linguistic space, as moreover happens with children where changes in space take place in these three areas:

*        the geographic space which inscribes the environmental space , especially the familial one, with its symbolisms and imagination;

*        the corporeal space which corresponds to the experience of the corporeal self. Each culture has its way of understanding bodily space, the boundaries of intimacy, conditions of conversation, ways of receiving, eating, caring for personal bodily hygiene: this is a very profound dimension difficult to modify and elaborate;

*        the linguistic space which, besides the language, also includes systems of non-verbal communication, vital and significant worlds.

Each formation itinerary will have to take into consideration the need to safeguard these three spaces to promote a correct process of individuation and re-elaboration of the personal and cultural identity of individual persons. The different changes in personal identity that take place in conjunction with the assumption of a charismatic vocation identity have as basic presupposition the typical modifications of these three spaces. If these are not respected identity disturbances can arise that are not always easily recognizable as such. Think, for example, of the feelings of frustration, inadequacy or inferiority resulting from not understanding linguistic or geographic needs, often linked to racial or nationalist prejudices and stereotypes. Thus, a lack of attention to the bodily space can be at the origin of problems that touch mostly the emotional, affective and sexual  sphere, in addition to disturbances in the nourishment area, like anorexia or bulimia.