The authors address one of the most significant aspects of social life in our times: that of cultural identities and identifications, and of the ways we construct them through our speech and the narrative of ourselves and others. They combine a theoretical re-assessment of how we understand, study and analyze processes of identification with detailed case studies of the discourses of three-generation families living in split-border communities along the former 'Iron Curtain', talking about themselves and other social groups, about their way of life and their experiences past and present.