Identity in university students: The semiotic work of making sense of yourself

The development of a deepened sense of self in young adults is a complex process. In this paper, we report on an interdisciplinary research project on identity formation among students at the University of the Free State from the perspective of semiotic work. Based on work in psychology and semiotics, we interviewed fifty-seven students about their identity. In particular, we asked students to bring along ‘something’ that they thought represents their identity, and we asked them to explain their choice. We first performed a semiotic analysis on the representations the students brought and then coded their motivations for themes. We found identity formation along the lines suggested by existing literature, with themes related to the importance of finding both an authentic and relational sense of self in a growth process that contains elements of hardship and strength. The study did, however, find two points of interests, namely the fact that very few students brought a material representation with them as well as the fact that students oscillated between resilience and succumbing to pressure.