The various expressions show that a single greeting can already tell us a lot about a speaker. When someone greets you with "Guten Tag", you attribute a national and therefore cultural identity (here: German) to this person. This differs from the English greeting "Good Morning", the typically Australian greeting "G'day" or the Irish greeting "What's the craic?". Although we can identify the speakers of the latter three greetings as English-speaking, these greetings differ regionally. Cultural identity can therefore not only be attributed to an English-speaking area in general, but it can also be differentiated into smaller cultural areas such as countries or even regions. 

Not only can we differentiate between cultural identities, but sometimes we can also determine the social identity of a speaker. This means that we get information about the relationship between the conversation participants just by hearing which greeting they use. For instance, we can say with a fair degree of certainty that the greeting "Heya" is mainly used by people who are familiar with each other and are in a more informal setting. Another feature that can be attributed to the category of social identity is found in the greeting "Yo bro". Here, we can be fairly certain that the speaker is a teenager, and they are talking to someone roughly the same age as they are. Age and the relationship between the speakers can therefore form part of social identity and are reflected in language.

But what do we do with the greeting “Good Morning”? You can use “Good Morning” in nearly every situation: From greeting your Parents after you have just woken up, to greeting the cashier from your local shop or even your teacher or your boss at work. Even though it is not as evident as in the other examples, we still find a way to make our “Good Morning” sound more or less formal. Language operates beyond words alone. Additionally, it can convey meaning through intonation (paraverbal) and non-verbal cues such as gestures and facial expressions. This is referred to as the multimodality of language. It gives us more possibilities to distinguish between social identities.

One further concept to consider when talking about identity is best illustrated by the greeting "What's the craic?". It can be used to express many aspects of a speaker’s identity at the same time, such as cultural identity (English-speaking, specifically Irish) and social identity (typically used between people that are of the same status, in rather informal settings). Therefore, identity is multilayered.

Another important part of identity is our personal identity, which is often described with adjectives. Let’s explore this in the following exercise.