Chapter 4: “Imagined Recursivity” and Stigma Management Among American Atheists*

Recursivity is a concept explicitly used in mathematics and linguistics; however, the term has yet to find a stable home in the social sciences. The purpose of this chapter is to contribute a social psychological variant of recursion, mainly, “imagined recursivity,” by returning to the work of Cooley and the “looking-glass self.” We examine the role of imagined recursivity in stigma management, in particular, regarding self-disclosure. We draw from 35 indepth interviews with a growing group in the United States called “Nones” (i.e., individuals who do not self-identify with any religion). Respondents claim that if plainly asked in conversation “are you religious?” they would openly reveal their (“discreditable”) nonreligious identity, which we will call the “displaced burden of disclosure.” Additionally, we believe that this technique has the practical utility of “hiding without hiding” their nonreligious identity. This protects the identity’s owner from feeling the need to actively conceal their identity under the promise that if they were hypothetically asked they would hypothetically tell. This strategy is, above all, an interactional gambit; in exchange for the freedom of not feeling silenced, individuals risk the chance to be revealed.