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Created: October 5, 2000
Latest update: December 24, 2000
jeanne
"When a person begins to employ his deviant behavior as a role based upon it aas a means of defense, attack, or adjustment to the overt and covert problems created by the consequent social reaction to him, hisdeviation is secondary [at p. 200] . . . . Most frequently there is a progressive reciprocal relationship between the deviation of the individual and the societal reaction . . . At this point a stigmatizing of the deviant occurs in the form of name calling, labeling, or stereotyping. [at p. 201]"
Edwin Lemert.Information on this concept was taken from pp.199-203 of Williams and McShane's Criminology Theory, Second Edition, Anderson Publishing, 1998. ISBN: 0-87084-201-3 (pbk).
Lemert suggests that deviance doesn't just happen, zap, with a single instance of behavior. He argues that there is first of all an act, perhaps mischievous, that deviates from the normatively expected behavior. That first act probably brings a reaction from the social context, since it violates norms. The reaction often involves admonition not to deviate again, and perhaps punishment. Other acts, and reactions, continue to occur. Lemert wisely suggests that some instances of deviance in this pattern are probably simply clumsy and unintended. Punishment and admonition for those acts may very well provoke a sense of being treated unjustly.
After a series of such interdependent interactions, eventually the person "begins to employ his deviant behavior or a role based upon it as a means of defense, attack, or adjustment to" the admonitions and prohibitions that behavior provokes. At that point, Lemert refers to "secondary deviance." (at p. 200)
Discussion Questions:
For jeanne's lecture notes on discussion questions click on the question number:
How does Lemert's conception of secondary deviance fit with Habermasian interdependence?
How does Lemert's conception of secondary deviance reflect a non-learning auto-poietic system?
How does Lemert's conception of secondary deviance reflect the adversarial paradigm in institutions dealing with deviance?