Identity work from the Global South: towards a pluriversal research agenda on identities

Abstract

Abstract Over the past two decades, the study of identities in and around organizations has consolidated around a vocabulary that includes identity work, identity regulation, identity play, and identity threat. This article argues that this vocabulary, while useful, is neither neutral nor universal. It rests on an epistemology and an ontology from the North, which take as their starting point a bounded, individual self. Drawing on the notion of the coloniality of being and on conceptions of the person originating from Southern traditions, the article rereads this vocabulary and proposes a research agenda organized around three axes: relationality, coloniality, and pluriversality. Each axis shows how a perspective from the South redefines central concepts in the field and points to concepts that have yet to be developed. The article makes three contributions: it makes visible the situated character of the vocabulary of identities; it mobilizes African, Latin American, and Asian authors as analytical tools rather than as illustration; and it presents a research agenda.