A Focus on (Cultural) Identity: From Instrument to Object of Research

Now more than ever, the term and the notion of identity are central to historical research. However, their use, which is widely accepted, is not without problems: as cultural anthropology studies have clearly shown, the word often proves to be ineffective in terms of the development of research and therefore of historical interpretation. In the brief notes that follow, I will take stock of the situation, retracing the major problems posed by the identitarian logic and attempting to assign identity itself the correct position and function with regard to historical investigations, taking account of its original values and meanings.