Abstract
Bruce Link proposes some advantages to expanding the meaning of stigma beyond its dictionary definition. I agree with him that stigma is not merely shame, but a particular kind of shame. For example, there is a shame that is completely self-induced, brought on by imagining, incorrectly, that others are rejecting him or her. Stigmatized persons are not incorrect in their perception of other’s views; they are being shamed by others. Yet, I think one must be very careful to expand the meaning only in this way, but no further.
Bruce has been good enough, at my prompting, to begin to mention shame in his work on stigma, if only in passing. But most researchers go extraordinarily far in expanding the meaning of stigma, to the point of not making the connection to the emotion of shame at all. Expansions become means of distraction. This failing has two disadvantages.
For researchers, there is the problem of not realizing that they are working with an emotion that has already received considerable and very helpful study. Of the thousands of studies of stigma, very few even mention shame, much less make use of the shame literature. The same is true of many other studies that involve shame, most also don’t make the connection: the topic of rejection is one obvious one, another, a newer topic, is ‘Social Suffering’. This failure narrows and slows down the advance of knowledge.
For the public, including most researchers, there is also another disadvantage, vastly more destructive than just slowing down research. They become part of the social system for hiding shame by circumlocution or just ignoring it completely. A person might say, for example, ‘I feel rejected’ or, ‘It was an awkward moment for me’. There are thousands of these kinds of evasions in the English language alone. Or one may just ignore feelings of shame by switching to a whole new arena, dreaming about or doing something else as a means of distraction.
The alienation that dominates modern societies is the basic cause of shame, the emotion that signals real or imagined rejection. Individuals supposedly in close relationships, such as those in the family, are often correct in feeling they are rejected. If we are going to better understand the process of universal alienation to the point of slowing it down, we may have to bring shame out in the open.