Stigma and Social Structures: A Goffmanian Analysis of Identity Formation in Almond

Abstract

This research reinterprets Sohn Won-Pyung’s Almond (2020) through Erving Goffman’s stigma theory, as outlined in Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity (1963), and employs Alan McKee's textual analysis methodology from Textual Analysis: A Beginner’s Guide (2003) to challenge the clinical pathologization of neurodivergence in literary criticism. Stigma, in Goffman’s formulation, is a social construct produced when society imposes normative expectations that discredit individuals failing to conform to dominant virtual identities. This analysis reveals how societal institutions, instead of individual deficits, lead to the generation of spoiled identities by enforcing rigid emotional norms. Through Goffman’s lens, the characters’ marginalization reveals systemic mechanisms of exclusion: Yunjae’s bonds with Gon, Dora, and Dr. Shim, alongside Gon’s affiliations with violent peers, constitute strategic back places: spaces where conventional stigma is suspended, allowing resistance to emerge through collective identity. Crucially, the novel’s ethical intervention crystallizes in Dr. Shim’s non-corrective approach, which diverges radically from maternal attempts to fix Yunjae’s neurodivergence. This distinction proves instrumental to Yunjae’s post-trauma development, catalyzing his capacity for curiosity and emotional resonance where corrective efforts failed. This research contributes to literary stigma studies and Sustainable Development Goal 10 by shifting focus from individual deficit to social structure, challenging pathologizing interpretations of neurodivergence and demonstrating how Almond illuminates systemic stigma mechanisms and resistance potential within alternative relational spaces.