Book Of The Month: In The Name Of Identity: Violence and The Need To Belong

In The Name Of Identity: Violence and The Need To Belong Amin Maalouf

About the book;

“I want to try and understand why so many people commit crimes in the name of identity,” writes Amin Maalouf. In this book, Amin Maalouf tries to find an answer to our identity crises and the hate towards communities. What exactly makes us ‘us’? : our background, our race, our religion… all go into making up who we are.

My thoughts on the book;

Our identities can become both glory and toxicity. In the name of identity, we humans in some cases commit crimes, and we blame a whole community for the actions of a select group. This book looks upon our identities in a couple of different aspects. In a person’s life, one’s identity can change depending on which age or their current beliefs, decisions. Now I might be disliking the color blue, but tomorrow I may like it. Communities play big roles in our identities. People like to be a part of a community. Being a part of a community can make us feel we are a part of something great and bigger than us. It can give us opportunities in a lot of areas, but also when it crosses a point it can lead to hate towards other communities(identities). When people start to divine their communities and ignore the other communities’ beliefs, systems, or even see them as bad, evil, worthless, we start to differ part as humanity. Even in this area of globalization seeing things like racism, colorism makes me sad and angry. Some people may believe that they are the only right ones, even if they think like that they should be respecting others. Respect is another problem of this age. Identities make us who we are. We shouldn’t hate others for their identities and we shouldn’t forget that people change. The future of humanity depends on accepting all identities.

Amin Maalouf;

Amin Maalouf is a Lebanese Christian writer who lives in France and writes in french. In his tales in the novels, he mixes historical events, romantic love, fantasy, and uses his imagination. He talks about the fundamental problems in our societies. In a lot of his books, he writes mostly about the Middle East and Asia. Weirdly this made me feel connected to his novels. The way he portraits his tales, makes you go to that era of time. I have read three of his books. All of them were beautiful in their way. He mixes history with a little fantasy so that it doesn’t bother anyone. His books are full of knowledge, a sense of humor, and philosophy.

You should read this book!!!

Even if you don’t like history, you should read this book!! I really recommend it. This book can help you to understand our society’s fundamental issues and dig deeper into your identity.

Dila Yontar

11/01/202

21:00