AN ESSAY ON THE POSSIBILITY OF A THEOLOGICAL IDENTITY: AN ANALYSIS OF OBJECTIFIED THEOLOGICAL (IDENTITY) THROUGH THE PROCESS OF SOCIAL EGO

The question of “Who am I?” starts with one's entrance into the world of existence and the answers to this question must necessarily include milieu relations. This necessity stems from the facts that ontologically, human beings are social entities and that they need others to sustain their life. As a result of this context, the study first establishes the concept of social ego and then presents the socio-political framework of a possible theological identity. The concept of social ego is primarily a reflection of per/ception. At this point, an individual puts himself at the centre as an object of the society. The data of the article have been collected qualitatively through interviews. The sample was chosen from the 1st, 2nd and 3rd year students of the Theology Faculty of Akdeniz University, Antalya, TR. The results were interpreted by the theories developed by Cooley's “mirror ego” and G. Mead's “I” and “me”. Within this framework, the students' replies to the question of “Who is a theologian?” have been read through the conceptualizations of exemplification, formality, introverted or outward-bound, idealization and unreachable. For instance, there were different replies to the question related to social ego perception emphasizing the importance of social gender. Female students replied it as worthy of being an exemplar, putting it into the context of an introversional rhetoric whereas male students, preferring to take it to an exemplary role model, have put it into the context of outwardly rhetorical discourses such as society and tradition.