ABSTRACT
We are living in a period of rapid change and over the last twenty years radical changes have occurred in every sphere and level of society. A number of competing theories have emerged to explain these changes and their impact on identities. At one end of the theoretical spectrum, it has been argued that we have entered a new postmodern period, characterised by fragmentation of experience, the dissolution of structural forces such as social class and gender, a diversity of lifestyles and the loss of predictability (Aronowitz and Giroux 1991). At the other end of the theoretical spectrum, modernist theorists argue that, despite a fragmentation of structures, the weakening of traditional ties and the breakdown of ‘ontological security’ (Giddens 1991), these changes do not mean that the metanarratives of social class, race and gender have ceased to say anything useful about identities in the new millennium (Phillips 1999).
