Identities: How do the arts shape who we are?

This research strand explores how the arts influence ideas of identity, belonging, and difference, from classical antiquity to the present day.

How are processes of identity-making, unmaking and remaking connected to questions of power and justice? How have people used cultural expressions to shape their conceptions of class, ethnic, religious, and sexual identities? How do the arts reinforce, question, or challenge these identities, and how do they shape the relation between individuals and communities? Key themes within this strand include gender and sexuality; borders, migration and mobility; and issues of decolonization, for example in present-day museum practice.