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This article follows the quest for identity of immigrant boys from the Caucasus to Israel, and focuses on the intersectionality of ethnicity, class, and gender in this process. Based on narrative interviews, the article shows the boys’ identities as multifaceted and dynamic, constructed by the boys themselves but also shaped by social forces imposed on them. The boys construct their identities in response to “identity wounds”: experiences of prejudice, pain, and degradation that are linked with the low value attributed to their ethnicity in Israeli society, and that occur in three different social arenas (the schools, the family and its relations to the labor market, and the social milieu). The boys respond to the attack on their ethnicity through forming an idealized ethnic identity, characterized by hyper-masculinity. Based on high levels of social solidarity and brotherhood, Kavkazi masculinity serves them as a source for individual power and pride as well as to protect the value of the ethnic community. The findings are discussed in the context of multiculturalism in Israel.

This chapter examines the concepts of ‘vulnerability’ and ‘resilience’, noting that most research focuses only on an individualised understanding of these terms. What can be known from empirical research is reviewed through the lens of intersectional theory, which accentuates the need for a whole-system approach to afford children greater protection. Just as online child sexual victimisation (OCSV) is not homogenous, neither are children. Their age, gender, race, sexualities, migration status, and class intersect and change over time. Vulnerability and resilience can be time and identity specific. They can also be fluid; a prior victimisation does not necessarily result in vulnerability, and resilience to one form of OCSV may not provide resilience to another. From a child's perspective, OCSV experience holds similarities and important differences in terms of perpetration and consequences, requiring tailored intersectional responses at the appropriate level.

This chapter dives into the exploration of how identities and the variables contributing to these identities converge. The author, a deaf counseling psychologist, uses the kaleidoscope as a metaphor to illustrate this process. She describes her own identity exploration as a deaf woman, including the ways that personal and professional identities have been influenced by multiple variables interacting with each other as illustrated by the movement of the various elements of the kaleidoscope. To broaden her understanding of her life journey, she relies on acculturation and intersectional theories and outlines how these theories fit with her experiences. She also examines the implications of deaf identity formation for psychological well-being.