Giddens holds that social-identity comprises the following five aspects:

Social identities comprise normative rights – the rights that we have as the rules, regulations and norms allow us to have. Along with normative rights we have the issue of obligations. If we have normative rights given to us that give us our sense of identity, we also have certain obligations. Then there are sanctions that are given to us or allowed us by society, and finally there are roles that we play in our cultural practices. These roles are constituted and are not arbitrary, and yet these roles are not for all time to come. These roles are dynamic, and are constituted by

a) Rights that are given to us

b) Obligations that we have to perform in return

c) Sanctions that are given to us by society.

Finally, markers are certain signs and symbols that are used to signify our identity. For example, our national anthem or regional anthem is such a marker, one that is, to use Barker's words, “emotionally charged”. If we wear a certain kind of attire, if we hold on to our language as a sign of our identity, then these are the markers that we carry and use in order to express that social-identity which is ours.

The important point here is to be noted is this – social identity is something that has to be constructed. Normative rights, obligations, sanctions, roles and markers constitute the external framework, through which identity is expressed even as it is constituted.

Therefore in Cultural Studies' terminology, ‘identity' is not a thing but a description in language. So cultural theorists who strictly belong to the language school or linguistic turn school of theory would go by the claim that identity is nothing but a linguistic expression, a verbal description in language.