Maria Cristina Moro Contrino

I develop a framework for a narrative approach to personal identity as a practical notion that focuses on the role of narratives employed in common, ordinary contexts and everyday interactions (henceforth ‘ordinary everyday narratives’). However, such narratives can be erroneous and contain factual errors and distortions, including delusions about one’s identity. I review three narrative approaches arguing that they do not account convincingly for the role of erroneous narratives for one’s practical identity. I argue that a practical identity is negotiated in ordinary everyday verbal and embodied narratives. According to my narrative approach, firstly, ordinary everyday narratives often suffice to convey one’s experiences, beliefs and aims within everyday interactions with others. Secondly, embodiment allows one to develop embodied narratives, i.e. temporally organised and goal-directed sequences of actions, habits and skills. Thirdly, one negotiates her practical identity through narratives and embodied interactions that structure first-personal and second-personal practical relations. I argue that a negotiated practical identity allows for the ‘repair’ of minor errors and the recognition of the practical significance of major errors, like delusional narratives, in shaping one’s practical identity. Finally, identity negotiation offers some scope for resistance against oppressive narratives.

I discuss the practical role of obsolete first-personal narratives, i.e. narratives one continues to tell when they no longer fit one’s current characteristics and environment. I discuss their practical vocation, benefits, and the problems they pose for the negotiation of practical relations fitting one’s current characteristics and concerns. I argue that such narratives, often important for one’s sense of identity and agency, involve a tension between one’s perspectives on the past and on the present; a sense of loss of the concreteness of one’s cherished past characteristics, practical relations and places; and sometimes also a resistance to the concreteness of current ones. Thus, they limit a practical engagement with one’s current interlocutors and environment. Sometimes scaffolding enables the practical role of obsolete first-personal obsolete narratives, providing one with a renewed sense of belonging and agency, as some research on people with dementia suggests. Yet, this practical success is often difficult to sustain. Telling first-personal obsolete narratives can be a way to resist an impoverished or oppressive practical identity, and the concreteness of the present. Obsolete first-personal narratives may be linked to one or more forms of perceived poverty of the present. Future research could further investigate the link between obsolete first-personal narratives, a resistance to the concreteness and perceived poverty of the present in contrast to one’s past, and its implications for one’s sense of identity, practical relations and well-being.