Further, identity, though socially given, is plastic. The meaning of the term ‘plastic' as far as we use it in the liberal arts and humanities is to be amenable to change. In biology, too, we talk about plasticity, for instance we refer to the plasticity of neurons, that is, the ability or the amenability of neurons to change with learning and experience. In the same way, identity is also plastic and amenable to change and therefore it is anti-essentialist. We understand essentialism as a theory or a force that considers things as having pure essences, as in phrases like ‘essential human nature.'

Essentialism would however argue that no matter how things change there is always something essential to a phenomenon, event, or a person. But this way of looking at identity as plastic, as a temporary, fluid and dynamic description, is an anti-essentialist move in sociology and cultural studies.