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double bind

   Also found in: Idioms, Wikipedia 0.09 sec.
double bind
n.
1. A psychological impasse created when contradictory demands are made of an individual, such as a child or an employee, so that no matter which directive is followed, the response will be construed as incorrect.
2. A situation in which a person must choose between equally unsatisfactory alternatives; a punishing and inescapable dilemma.
ThesaurusLegend:  Synonyms Related Words Antonyms
Noun1.double bind - (psychology) an unresolvable dilemma; situation in which a person receives contradictory messages from a person who is very powerful
dilemma, quandary - state of uncertainty or perplexity especially as requiring a choice between equally unfavorable options
psychological science, psychology - the science of mental life
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In chapters 4 and 5, McManus makes her best contribution in a series of fine readings of passages in books 2, 4, and 6, in which Spenser engages the complexities of the cultural situation of the court ladies, who found themselves in a double bind between the twin cultural imperatives to be irreproachably chaste, and yet put themselves forward to make marriages advantageous to their aristocratic families.
Spenser's Faerie Queene and the Reading of Women by Hoffman, Katherine / Renaissance Quarterly
The same principal can be used to double bind a defensive end who is playing a 5 technique.
A dozen ways to manipulate a defense by Hand, Leo / Coach and Athletic Director
In fact, all of us are caught in the double bind of a wave of retirements (an estimated 30,000 over the next three years) and booming enrollments (an estimated increase of about a million students by 2010).
Can we get a little help here? Few newly minted Ph.D. faculty are ... by Fulton, Richard D. / University Business
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