Sri Lanka, March 20 -- Those who identify with issues that deal with country or gender, identify with these matters as an end in themselves. That was not supposed to be how it was. Why does identification become an end in itself for so many people?

Some of these identities are innocuous enough. They have been borrowed from experience, or have something to do with nostalgia.

People identify with the groups they grew up in. It could be as simple as the group that met in the corner, on fifth avenue, near the grocery store. It can be that precise.

It is in this context that this writer hopes to base this article on nostalgia for the past. People do say much about how and where they grew up, and some periods are special it seems on a global...