In labeling theory, role engulfment refers to how a person's identity becomes based on a role the person assumes, superseding other roles.[1][2][3]

A negative role such as "sick" can serve to constrict a person's self-image.[4]

Professions

Jungians have highlighted the possibility of role engulfment by one's profession: 'every calling or profession has its own characteristic persona...the danger is that people become identical with their personas—the professor with his textbook, the tenor with his voice'.[5] The problem is particularly acute with what Alasdair Macintyre calls characters—'a very special type of social role which places a certain kind of moral constraint on the personality of those who inhabit them...masks worn by moral philosophies'.[6]

Athletics

Role engulfment can also occur in a more mainstream context. It has been explored for example with regard to college athletes. Having initially entered college with a "broad" agenda, many then 'experienced "role-engulfment"...the "greedy role" of athletics soon dominated their time, actions, and social circles'.[7] Athletes may have themselves narrowed their focus too early: 'one of the consequences of identity foreclosure or role engulfment was the inability to foresee and plan for future roles'.[8]

Mothers

Family therapy sees part of the father's role in early child-raising, faced with maternal engulfment, as 'to haul her back, to reclaim her, as it were, from the baby. So that the two of them can put their own relationship as a married couple first again'.[9] (It also notes a potentially wider need 'to see new meanings put into role names' in a family context).[10] Whereas some '"good" mothers are able to demonstrate role commitment without role engulfment',[11] others may find the role of "devoted mother" becomes an all-embracing one. 'Role engulfment, by reducing the opportunities for contacts with friends and family, leaves the parent with fewer sources of positive self-evaluation outside of the family'.[12]

Deviance

Edwin Schur, building on the work of Erik H. Erikson and Kai Erikson on "The Confirmation of the Delinquent"[13] brought the term "role engulfment" to the theoretical fore in relation to deviancy: '"Role engulfment" refers to the process whereby persons become caught up in the deviant role as a result of others relating to them largely in terms of their spoiled identity'.[14] Conversely, the deviant may themselves embrace the role. 'When a particular role becomes an integral part of a person's identity, almost to the exclusion of all other roles, role merger (or role engulfment) is said to occur. Such a role is often referred to as a "master role"'.[15]

Literary

Related terms

The term Role domination also refers to the process of how a particular role comes to dominate over other roles in a person's life.[18]

Role abandonment refers to the disassociation of and detachment of other goals, priorities, and roles following role engulfment.[18]

See also

References

  1. ^ Pfuhl, Erdwin H.; Henry, Stuart (1993-12-31). The deviance process. Transaction Publishers. pp. 168–169. ISBN 978-0-202-30470-0. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
  2. ^ Farrell, Ronald A.; Swigert, Victoria Lynn (1978). Social deviance. Lippincott. p. 143. ISBN 978-0-397-47385-4. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
  3. ^ Schur, Edwin M. (1971). Labeling deviant behavior: its sociological implications. Harper & Row. p. 79. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
  4. ^ Sandell, Richard (2002). Museums, society, inequality. Psychology Press. pp. 79–80. ISBN 978-0-415-26059-6. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
  5. ^ C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections (London 1983) p. 416
  6. ^ Alasdair Macintyre, After Virtue (London 1981) p. 27-8
  7. ^ R. Giulianotti, Sport (2005) p. 17
  8. ^ Sparkes, The Sport Psychologist Vol 17 (2003)
  9. ^ R. Skynner/J. Cleese, Families and how to survive them (1994) p. 189
  10. ^ Virginia Satir, Peoplemaking (1983) p. 281
  11. ^ Christina Hughes, Women's Contemporary Lives (2002) p. 70
  12. ^ B. J. Kramer/E. H. Thompson, Men as Caregivers (2002) p. 285
  13. ^ Erik H. Erikson, Childhood and Society (Penguin 1973) p. 299
  14. ^ E. H. Pfuhl/S. Henry, The Deviance Process (1993) p. 168
  15. ^ Richard C. Stephens, The Street Addict Role (1991) p. 36
  16. ^ Tony Tanner, "Introduction" Pride and Prejudice (Penguin 1975) p. 27-8
  17. ^ Judith McCombs, Essays on Margaret Attwood (1986) p. 73 and p. 86
  18. ^ a b Adler, Patricia A.; Adler, Peter (1991-09-15). Backboards and Blackboards: College Athletes and Role Engulfment. Columbia University Press. p. 27. ISBN 978-0-231-07307-3. Retrieved 12 January 2011.

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