Editing Persona (section)

{{short description|Public image of one's personality}}
{{About|the concept|other uses|Persona (disambiguation)}}
{{More citations needed|date=February 2020}}

A '''persona''' (plural '''personae''' or '''personas''') is a strategic mask of identity in public,<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Marshall |first1=P. David |last2=Barbour |first2=Kim |date=2015-04-30 |title=Making Intellectual Room for Persona Studies: A New Consciousness and a Shifted Perspective |url=https://ojs.deakin.edu.au/index.php/ps/article/view/464 |journal=Persona Studies |language=en |volume=1 |issue=1 |doi=10.21153/ps2015vol1no1art464 |issn=2205-5258|hdl=10536/DRO/DU:30072974 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> the public image of one's [[personality]], the social [[role]] that one adopts, or simply a fictional [[Character (arts)|character]].<ref>[[mwod:persona|"Persona"]], ''[[Merriam-Webster.com]]'', Merriam-Webster, Inc., 2020.</ref> It is also considered "an intermediary between the individual and the institution."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bosch |first=Mineke |date=January 2013 |title=Persona and the Performance of Identity Parallel Developments in the Biographical Historiography of Science and Gender, and the Related Uses of Self Narrative |url=http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/lhomme.2013.24.issue-2/lhomme.2013.24.2.11/lhomme.2013.24.2.11.xml |journal=L'Homme |volume=24 |issue=2 |doi=10.7767/lhomme.2013.24.2.11 |s2cid=148183584 |issn=2194-5071 |access-date=2023-05-01 |archive-date=2018-07-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180702095416/https://www.degruyter.com/view/j/lhomme.2013.24.issue-2/lhomme.2013.24.2.11/lhomme.2013.24.2.11.xml |url-status=dead |url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Persona studies is an academic field developed by communication and media scholars.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Persona Studies |url=https://ojs.deakin.edu.au/index.php/ps/index |access-date=2023-04-23 |website=ojs.deakin.edu.au}}</ref> The related notions of "impression management" and "presentation of self" have been discussed by Erving Goffman<ref>{{Cite book |last=Goffman |first=Erving |title=The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life |publisher=University of Edinburgh |year=1956 |isbn= |pages= 132ff}}</ref> in the 1950s. 

The word ''persona'' derives from Latin, where it originally referred to a theatrical [[mask]].<ref name="Bishop2007">{{cite book |last=Bishop |first=Paul |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FUthjkCD6JgC&pg=PA157 |title=Analytical Psychology and German Classical Aesthetics: Goethe, Schiller, and Jung, Volume 1: The Development of the Personality |date=July 30, 2007 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |isbn=978-0-203-96088-2 |pages=157–158 |access-date=August 27, 2013}}</ref> The usage of the word dates back to the beginnings of Latin civilization.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/11523564 |title=The Category of the person : anthropology, philosophy, history |date=1985 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |others=Michael Carrithers, Steven Collins, Steven Lukes |isbn=0-521-25909-6 |location=Cambridge [Cambridgeshire] |oclc=11523564}}</ref> The Latin word derived from the [[Etruscan language|Etruscan]] word "{{Lang|ett|phersu}}," with the same meaning, and that from the Greek {{Lang|el|[[Prosopon|πρόσωπον]]|italic=no}} (''{{Lang|el-latn|prosōpon}}'').<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Etruscan Phersu - phersuminiatures |url=https://sites.google.com/site/phersuminiatures/galleries/the-etruscan-phersu |access-date=2023-05-01 |website=sites.google.com}}</ref> It is the etymology of the word "person," or "parson" in French.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023 |title=Person, n. |url=https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/141476#eid30948551 |website=Oxford English Dictionary}}</ref> Latin etymologists explain that persona comes from "per/sonare" as "the mask through which (per) resounds the voice (of the actor)."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Mouss |first=Marcel |title=Category of the Person |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1985 |pages=14}}</ref>

Its meaning in the latter Roman period changed to indicate a "character" of a [[theatrical]] performance or [[court of law]],<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Horsman |first1=Yasco |last2=Korsten |first2=Frans-Willem |date=2016-09-01 |title=Introduction: Legal Bodies: Corpus/Persona/Communitas |journal=Law & Literature |volume=28 |issue=3 |pages=277–285 |doi=10.1080/1535685X.2016.1232924 |issn=1535-685X|doi-access=free }}</ref> when it became apparent that different individuals could assume the same role and that legal attributes such as rights, powers, and duties followed the role. The same individuals as actors could play different roles, each with its own legal attributes, sometimes even in the same court appearance.