Difference between revisions of "identity"

Revision as of 21:50, 31 March 2006

Identity may refer to one of the following:

In social science and psychology:

• social identity. In the social sciences, identity has specific meanings, stemming from cognitive theory, sociology, politics, and psychology. See also identity politics.
• ethnic identity is a person's self-affiliation (or categorization by others) as a member of an ethnic group.
• gender identity is the gender with which a person identifies (or is identified by others).
• digital identity is the representation of identity in terms of digital information.
• online identity is the digital identity established by computer network users.
• psychological identity is the concept that an individual has a unique identity developed relatively late in history.

In philosophy:

• identity (philosophy) is the sameness of two things (also see law of identity)
• identity theory of mind, in the philosophy of mind, holds that the mind is identical to the brain
• personal identity, in philosophy

In mathematics:

• An identity is an equality that holds regardless of the values of its variables.
• An identity object is an entity that does not change other objects: see identity function, identity element, identity matrix, and identity morphism.

In computer science:

• identity (object-oriented programming), a property of objects that allows those objects to be distinguished from each other.

In creative works:

• identity (book) is a novel written by Milan Kundera.
• identity (film) is a movie starring John Cusack.
• identity (music), a transformation of pitches in music.

In business:

• corporate identity is the physical manifestation of a business brand.
• identity theft is the deliberate appropriation of someone else's identity (without that person's permission) for criminal purposes.