Bridging Self and Sociality: Identity Construction and Social Context

Sierk Ybema
The Oxford Handbook of Identities in Organizations
Edited by Andrew D. Brown

Print Publication Date: Jan 2020 Subject: Business and Management, Human Resource Management
Online Publication Date: Feb 2020 DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198827115.013.50

Abstract and Keywords

‘Identity’, Berger and Luckmann (1991: 195) maintained, ‘remains unintelligible unless it is located in a world’. In
order to ‘locate’ identity, this chapter provides, first, a theoretical underpinning for an essentially social under‐
standing of identity construction by conceptualizing identities as arising at the intersection of, and in the interac‐
tion between, people’s personal lifeworlds and environing social worlds. Second, it discusses the implications of
such a view, summarizing the principles underpinning a social constructivist perspective in terms of five p’s: iden‐
tity as positioning, performance, (co)production, process, and (an act or effect of) power. Third, it locates identity
construction in four different worlds or social circuits where we might observe the interaction between self and so‐
ciality ‘in action’: (1) inner conversations (self-directed positioning), (2) self–other definitions (relational position‐
ing), (3) situated interactions (reciprocal positioning), and (4) institutional dynamics (subject positioning). By
sketching what to look for (the five p’s) and where to look (the four circuits), this chapter assists scholars in de‐
ploying identity as an analytical bridge between agency and structure.

Keywords: identity, self, social constructivist perspective, agency, structure

Sierk Ybema

Sierk Ybema is a Professor at Anglia Ruskin University and Associate Professor at Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam.

Access to the complete content on Oxford Handbooks Online requires a subscription or purchase. Public
users are able to search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter without a
subscription.

Please subscribe or login to access full text content.

If you have purchased a print title that contains an access token, please see the token for information about
how to register your code.
 For questions on access or troubleshooting, please check our FAQs, and if you can''t find the answer there,
please contact us.

PRINTED FROM OXFORD HANDBOOKS ONLINE (www.oxfordhandbooks.com). © Oxford University Press, 2018. All Rights Reserved. Under the terms o
of a title in Oxford Handbooks Online for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice).

date: 02 October 2021