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Ralf Linton's approach to social role

The approach to role theory derives from Ralph Linton and incorporated into functionalism. This moves away from role taking as the characteristic form of interaction with role making as its outcome and sees role as essentially prescribed and static expectations of behavior. These prescriptions derive from society's culture and expressed as social norm. The functionalist approach results in role becoming a set of static, semi global expectations laid down by a unified society as simply prescriptions for correct behavior. The functionalist approach as great difficulty in accounting for variability and flexibility of roles and finds it difficult to account for the vast differences in the way that individuals conceive different roles.

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