Idee d’identità. Fare per essere, rappresentare per dover essere

This essay is on identity in Sardinia and it’is composed of two parts. The first analyses some aspects of the identity of an old shepherd at the end of his working life. The man offers a perfect example of a strong identity based on work and production, a type of identity – constructed on work – that is largely recurrent in modern times. The second part of the text introduces some theoretical reflections and hypotheses about identity in postmodernity, identifying its distinctive features in: flexibility, uncertainty, the loss of traditional work’s central role, and the importance of the one played by the market and consumption in people’s every day life. The author’s reasoning begins by proposing a distinction between a «primary identity» (wich is developed in daily face-to-face relationship) and a «exhibited identity» as the one that - including some aspects of «traditional» culture – represents, through the «sale of identity», an important resource for local politics and tourism economy.