In this piece, I’m going to talk about the psychosocial moratorium, identity crisis, social influences on
identity, and the role of parents in the identity formation of their ward.
Coined by Erik H. Erikson, the psychosocial moratorium is a brief period during which people
consider what they want to do with their lives after which most of them settle into socially prescribed
roles. This phase is placed in the schedule of human development between childhood and adulthood
and is called the Psychosocial moratorium. To describe it in simple words, this is the stage where a
person is exploring the career what-ifs and hasn’t committed to one particular stream yet.
In the Hindi movie Tamasha, Ved’s moratorium stage is depicted. He doesn’t commit to studying
engineering and making a career out of it at the same time he’s not sure of what he wants to do other
than engineering either. We can very evidently see his love for stories. But, the thought of working for
it, hasn’t even entered his mind as it’s “not enough money” and to think logically, he would want a
career that provides him with financial stability instead of just pursuing his passion. This perfectly
portrays what society- the people around him, has fed his mind.
Moving on to talk about identity crisis, it is a developmental event in which a person questions their
sense of self or their place in the world The concept is based on the work of developmental
psychologist Erik Erikson, who believed that one of the most important conflicts that people face is
the formation of identity. Ved, is caught between the complexity of his identity as he is unable to
decide what he is like in real- Don from Corsica or Ved, a corporate slave. He goes through an
identity crisis after Tara reveals her thoughts about him pretending like he’s somebody else while he
hides how free-spirited and fun and different, he is.
To understand the role of parents in identity formation, the film depicts that Ved’s father gives him an
example of his grandfather choosing a job that would not have been interested him because of mere
helplessness, while this can be an important lesson to Ved, it’s not a piece of great advice for that
particular moment.
As we all would agree, parents don’t have any bad intentions for us, they just want us to be safe and
satisfied in life. To be satisfied one of the most important things is having a stable job according to
them. While they have a say in choosing their children’s life, stability should not be considered as the
only factor. According to me, aptitude and interest go hand in hand. This means that if one is not
interested but has the aptitude for it, there are still a high number of chances for him/her to fail in that
particular subject, and vice versa.
How people’s self-concepts are based on their membership in social groups is referred to as social
identity. Sports teams, religions, nationalities, occupations, sexual orientation, ethnic groups, and
gender are all examples. Ved’s identity is influenced by the people he works with. We can see in the
movie that he’s inspired by his boss and wants to become like him, but when he’s seen sitting around
people, he doesn’t even know he goes back to his liking for story-telling, which at the end is what he
wants to pursue, and makes him happy in life.