Difference Matters: Communicating Social Identity
Written by Brenda J. Allen
About 197 pages
Originally published in 2004
Rate 4/5
I was introduced to Difference Matters in my Intercultural Communication Encounters class at Utah Valley University. Difference Matters corresponds with many subject matters within the classroom and in the real world. Difference Matters is formatted as a textbook, which might sound really dull to the majority of potential readers, but I assure you, it was not a waste of time.
Brenda J. Allen brings her own life experiences into the textbook as well as other people's. As Allen communicates her experiences, she picks apart expects of the interactions and teaches us why difference(s) matters.
In Difference Matters, we learn why power, gender, race, social class, sexuality, ability, and age matter when we are communicating social identities. "Humans engage in social processes to manufacture differences; they refer to dominant belief systems to conclude that some differences are more important than others; and they assign value-based meanings to those differences." (Allen, 184)
My thoughts on Difference Matters: Communicating Social Identity
I really enjoyed having Difference Matters as an assigned reading for my Intercultural Communication Encounters class because it gave me and my classmates the opportunity to discuss the array of topics within it. The discussions were a big part of why I liked reading the book so much; if you choose to read this, talk about it with others.
A part from the interesting discussions Difference Matters was involved in, it was also very educational. Difference Matters and the professor introduced me to topics I would have normally shied away from, which is another reason I liked it so much. I haven't had the opportunity to read something like this until now, and now that I have, I want to read more.