Experiences of alienation and identity work in professional work

• In Event: 413 - Section on Organizations, Occupations and Work Refereed Roundtable Session. Table 01. Culture and Organizations
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: Table 05. Identity

Abstract

Research on alienation has been focused on blue-collar work for a long time, and there are only few studies that try to understand alienation in professional work. In the last years different authors report increasing dangers of experiencing alienation at work for professions. Therefore this paper identifies subjective experiences of alienation in three Marxist categories and also describes the strategies that professionals use to resist alienation and experience meaningfulness in their work. The observations are grounded on a sample of 40 professionals who work as physicians or social workers. The study shows that professionals use different cognitive emotional strategies to cope with alienation.

Author

• Friedericke Hardering