自1987年臺灣方面開放民眾赴中國大陸探親伊始,在歷經20年廣泛而全面的交流後,兩岸之間原本潛存著各種「看不見的差異」正日漸浮現,彼此雙方漸漸地看見了對方-「他者」,一個意向的真實對象,而不再是一個過去雙方政府宣傳中「我們的同胞」之意象虛構的對象。同時,雙方民眾也從「鏡中我」產生了一種相對於「他者」的「我們意識」之建構。實際上,在兩岸實際的社會交流與互動過程中,所有參與交流的民眾均可能面臨情境認同與身分認同的兩難困境,以及彼此都是對方的「他者」之身分再確認過程。因此,身分認同成了兩岸社會交流與互動過程中的核心議題,而多數臺灣民眾的身分認同則正處在一種「自我」與「他者」的「分合」遽變中。
Since the Taiwan government deregulated family visits to Mainland China in 1987, thriving cross-strait exchanges over the past twenty years have brought hidden invisible divides to surface. Each side has gradually begun to see the opposite side-the other-as a real subject, instead of as a projected image shaped by the government's propaganda. People of either side have built from the mirror reflection a ”we-feeling” as opposed to the ”others”. In social exchanges and interactions, many have been caught between situational identity and personal identification and must go through a process of confirming self identity in the other's eyes of the other. While identity remains the core issue of cross-strait social exchanges, many Taiwan people are in the process of fragmengration of self and the rebuilding of other.