Social Identity Theory

Is a person's sense of who they are based on their group membership. Tajfel (1979) proposed that the groups (e.g. social class, family, football team) which people belonged to were an important source of pride and self-esteem.

Social Identity can create different tribes because everybody is different and unique in their own way which means they are easily fitted into different groups and are able to get along with people that have more in common with them. Sometimes being different to others can cause conflicts because there are differences in the way people do and say things. Often this can lead to social comparison where the group the individual has identified themselves with starts to compare themselves against their out group, they see themselves as better, this leads to discrimination, which leads on to prejudice.

Social identity can be linked to Ideology because for example there is basic agreement that rock “is a form of music with a strong beat,” but it is difficult to be much more explicit. The Collins English Dictionary suggests that “rock is a kind of music with simple tunes and a very strong beat that is played and sung, usually loudly, by a small group of people with electric guitars and drums,” but there are so many exceptions to this description that it is practically useless. Many may disagree and argue that this is the wrong definition of Rock and roll and that is because of the difference of opinions people may have about one certain type of music genre.

This can then be associated with music magazines because of the way that the genre is portrayed through the use of colour, font and images. For instance, in the Kerrang magazine the look is very different to top of the pops magazine as the styles of music are completely different to each other.