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In this paper, the author arranges some of the major treatments of alienation within a coherent framework. He introduces a distinction between disassociation (certain specified objective conditions) and alienation (a specified experience) and articulates the relationship between these two by presenting a series of intervening psychological issues. A typology of human association is presented, and it is argued that especially two types of disassociation (i.e., marginality and subordination) and, to some extent, another (i.e., privilege) may be productive of alienation These conditions are considered at the cultural, social, and psychological levels of analysis. Variables connecting these conditions and alienation include the perception of the condition, evaluation, integration, blame, and response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A model of the role acquisition process is proposed based on data from 310 first-person written narratives of a single role entrance. Content analysis of data set II (N = 110) of narratives, which included forty-seven different roles, provides support for the model. The model conceptualizes role acquisition as involving a sequence of four stages. characterized as (1) ambivalence. (2) absorption, (3) commitment, and (4) confidence, in which each stage involves a qualitatively different interaction between the person and the role: a different affective orientation on the part of the person toward the role, and a qualitatively different relationship between the person and role partners. Common features and heterogeneous effects of role type, social context, cognitive processes, and other factors at each stage are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on culture identity and dress. The sociology of dress is a vibrant field, exploring intriguing theoretical, methodological, and empirical domains. During the mid-twentieth century, clothing scholars began investigating the sociological and psychological implications of dress and appearance. In 1989, a group met to discuss the direction of the analysis of dress. The published papers from that meeting considered a wide range of topics, including identity, social psychology, cultural anthropology and sociology, semiotics, affect and cognition, social construction of gender, literary analysis, as well as qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Recent textbooks in the area continue to thaw from sociology and other fields to refine theories of dress and human behavior. Related to the misperception that dress only applies to the psychology of the self is the notion that dress is trivial both substantively and theoretically. Perhaps sociologists' neglect of dress might also be linked to a misperception that it is nonrational behavior similar to other actions that do not lend themselves to systematic analysis. Again these articles provide a contrasting view. In organizational and institutional settings, such as greedy organizations, total institutions, and mass media, dress and all it symbolizes are debated and discussed in ways that can be studied scientifically. Further, all of the articles have identified patterns in how dress is used in identity embracing and distancing that can be incorporated into broader theoretical frameworks.