Shame is a pluriform phenomenon with many implications and ramifications in the discourses in which it appears. Subsequent chapters explore the phenomenology, causes and responses that pertain to a particular kind of shame – chronic, dysfunctional shame. Before focussing on this type of shame, however, it will be useful to place shame in ecological context. This chapter therefore provides preliminary orientation to some important issues and discussions that pertain to shame in general terms. The chapter falls into four discrete sections that each situate shame within a particular kind of conceptual ecology.

In the first section, I try to capture the range of meanings and experiences that seem to be suggested when contemporary people in Western societies talk about shame. The second section of the chapter outlines some of the functions that have been suggested for the phenomenon of shame in individual and social life. It will then be appropriate to look at some of the fundamental distinctions that are made in trying to identify different kinds of shame. One major distinction that is made is that of acute, appropriate shame as distinguished from chronic dysfunctional shame. The last section is then concerned to locate understandings of shame within an appropriate metaphorical ecology. Here I suggest that shame, particularly chronic, dysfunctional shame, is best placed within the broad ecology of meanings that are associated with pollution, stain and defilement.