Katherine Vidueira

This paper explores the agency of marginalized individuals navigating negative social scripts, arguing that such scripts threaten autonomy and authenticity by acting as external guiding principles that do not reflect the individual's self-conception. I call agents that navigate these social scripts double agents because they are constituted by double consciousness – an acute awareness of how they are perceived by others. This awareness leads double agents to endorse a new guiding principle that tells them to use social scripts strategically. This preserves autonomy and authenticity by allowing the agent to be guided by a principle she endorses and perform actions she believes reflect her self-conception. However, one aspect of authenticity, otherauthenticity, is undermined as others fail to recognize double agents as the agents they are. This highlights the harms of marginalization and social scripts as double agents risk becoming alienated from their own self-conception and contributing to their own marginalization.