Critic speak is tough, but we've got you covered.
Quote :"Cultural Identity and Diaspora"
There is, however, a second, related but different view of cultural identity. This second position recognizes that, as well as the many points of similarity, there are also critical points of deep and significant difference which constitute "'what we really are"'; or rather—since history has intervened—"'what we have become"'. We cannot speak for very long, with any exactness, about "'one experience, one identity"', without acknowledging its other side—the ruptures and discontinuities which constitute, precisely, the Caribbean's "'uniqueness"'. Cultural identity, in this second sense, is a matter of "'becoming"' as well as "'being"'. It belongs to the future as much as to the past. It is not something which already exists, transcending place, time, history and culture. Cultural identities come from somewhere, have histories. But like everything which is historical, they undergo constant transformation. Far from being eternally fixed in some essentialised past, they are subject to the continuous "'play"' of history, culture and power. Far from being grounded in mere "'recovery"' of the past, which is waiting to be found, and which when found, will secure our sense of ourselves into eternity, identities are the names we give to the different ways we are positioned by, and position ourselves within, the narratives of the past.
It is only from this second position that we can properly understand the traumatic character of "'the colonial experience"'. The ways in which black people, black experiences, were positioned and subject-ed in the dominant regimes of representation were the effects of a critical exercise of cultural power and normalization. Not only, in Said's "'Orientalist"' sense, were we constructed as different and other within the categories of knowledge of the West by those regimes. They had the power to make us see and experience ourselves as "'Other"'.
We definitely can't be as eloquent as Stuart Hall, but we'll try to be briefer. He's got three major points here. First, "'identity"' isn't something that you're just born with or that's static throughout life; it's constantly in flux because society is constantly changing (and thus, so are the people in it).
Second, "'identities"' show more about where we are in our historical moment (i.e., our "'positions"'), whether the "'identity"' was chosen by us or given to us by those in power. Your identity now is different from your identity when you listened to Carrie Underwood and Bush was president and there was no such thing as Real Housewives of Orange County.
Third, the fact that "'identity"' isn't something "'essential"' or innate is the way to understand why colonialism was so traumatic for Caribbean people. Why is this last point so major? Because the identity of the Caribbean (or "'black"') person was something created out of colonial oppression. When you're oppressed, it's not like your oppressor makes you feel all good about yourself; they make you feel different, inferior, less than human—in Hall's words, the oppressor makes you "'see and experience [yourselves] as 'Other'."'
Stuart Hall is like the Edward Said of postcolonial critics in the UK. But that's not the only reason why you should read his stuff—he's pretty eloquent at putting together all these highfalutin theories into emotional, accessible ideas, just like in the passage above.
We'll also point out that this passage in particular shows how powerful the idea of a fluctuating identity can be. Sure, maybe your identity—especially if you're "'black"' (which, in the UK, refers to anyone with dark skin, including Arab immigrants and Caribbeans)—isn't something you necessarily chose. But that also means that you have the potential to change how you and others think of yourself, because it's a "'matter of 'becoming' as well as 'being'."' It's something that can (and probably will) exist differently in the future.
Anyway, Hall doesn't go so far as to say all of this up above, but the logical extension of all this fluctuating identity stuff is the whole reason postcolonialists can be so critical of everything—they're fighting for control over who they are and can be.