From cruise director to rabbi: Authoring the agentic self through conventions of narrative necessity

Document Type

Article

Date of Original Version

1-1-2019

Abstract

The concept of (self-)identity has become increasingly central to institutional theory’s microfoundations, yet remains relatively underdeveloped. In this chapter, the authors use an autobiographical interview with a gay Protestant minister in the US to explore the role of narrative conventions in the construction of self-identity. The analysis of this chapter offers the basis for a new understanding of the relation between institutions, self-identity, and agency: how we agentically engage institutions depends not only on who we narrate ourselves to be, but also on how we narrate ourselves into being. This suggests that narration as a specific modality of micro-institutional processes has important performative effects.

Publication Title, e.g., Journal

Research in the Sociology of Organizations

Volume

65B

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