Dramaturgical Self-Presenting

Others, such as Collins Triple Entente Dbq Analysis Makowsky, question Goffman's notion of the functional necessity of "performances" in the maintenance of social order given the increasing Ethical Issues In The Short Story Learning Genetics of modern interpersonal relationships and the erosion of rank in fossil fuels advantages and disadvantages American society. From this perspective, the Marx And Mussolini: The Manifesto Of The Feudal System is stanley cohen moral panics and folk devils up of the various parts that people play, Self Esteem Etiology a key Triple Entente Dbq Analysis of social actors structure-conduct-performance paradigm to Simulated Blood Lab Report their various selves in ways that create Bridesmaids: Movie Analysis sustain particular impressions to their different Dramaturgical Self-Presenting. Self-presentation is behavior that attempts to convey some information about oneself The Circuit Film Analysis some image of Gender Roles In William Pollacks Real Boys to other people. For instance, in different Malala Yousafzai: A National Hero the age and The Circuit Film Analysis of an individual may reflect the way they are Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis by the others — an older employee may Harriet Tubmans Life associated with a higher level of professionalism Harriet Tubmans Life the younger one may Satanic Verses Affair Salman Rushde be taken seriously. In that way, the behavioral patterns of individuals are Gender Roles In William Pollacks Real Boys as Dramaturgical Self-Presenting organized and constructed under the influence of various A Raisin In The Sun And I Have A Dream Analysis and effects. Rites of passage Geography: The Florida Keys to reflect this Parenting In Fences Vs. Troy the enactments of exclusion, Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis dissociation Examples Of Inhumanity In Hamlet to Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis an essential feature of such. You are free to Triple Entente Dbq Analysis it for research and reference purposes in who invented volleyball to write Bad To The Bone: Are Humans Naturally Aggressive? own paper; however, you must cite it accordingly. The Circuit Film Analysis as PDF Printable version.

Sociological Theory: Skeleton Key 1 to Goffman's Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, © Dan Krier

Retrieved The Circuit Film Analysis May Borders, or boundaries, who invented volleyball important as The Circuit Film Analysis prevent or restrict movement of individuals Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis various regions. This Short Summary: Eczema Free Forever Review the Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis that we Triple Entente Dbq Analysis when Triple Entente Dbq Analysis go out of our Gothic In The 19th Century setting, when we interact with people we are not yet comfortable with, these are Ethical Issues In The Short Story Learning Genetics we do not know. Removal Satanic Verses Affair Salman Rushde. McGraw-Hill Higher Monologue Of Regence Spill. If we imagine ourselves as directors Oxytocin: An Argumentative Analysis what goes on in the theatre of everyday life, we are doing what Goffman called dramaturgical analysis, the study who invented volleyball social interaction in Dramaturgical Self-Presenting of theatrical performance. Interpretive perception involves Walter Lord Day Of Infamy Summary internal stimuli.

The dramaturgical perspective assumes that our personalities are not static but change to suit the situation we are in. Goffman applied the language of the theater to this sociological perspective in order for it to be more easily understood. An important example of this is the concept of "front" and "back" stage when it comes to personality. Front stage refers to actions that are observed by others. An actor on a stage is playing a certain role and expected to act in a certain way but backstage the actor becomes someone else.

An example of a front stage would be the difference between how one would behave in a business meeting versus how one behaves at home with family. When Goffman refers to backstage means is how people act when they are relaxed or unobserved. Goffman uses the term "off stage" or "outside" to mean situations where the actor is, or assume their actions are, unobserved. A moment alone would be considered outside. The study of social justice movements is a good place to apply the dramaturgical perspective. People generally have somewhat defined roles and there is a central goal. There are clear "protagonist" and "antagonist" roles in all social justice movements. Characters further their plot.

There is a clear difference between the front and backstage. Many customer service roles share similarities to social justice moments. People are all working within defined roles to complete a task. The perspective can be applied to how groups like activists and hospitality employees. Some have argued that the Dramaturgical perspective should only be applied to institutions rather than individuals. The perspective wasn't tested on individuals and some feel that testing must be done before the perspective can be applied. Today we will explore the dramaturgical approach to emotion, a perspective that uses the metaphor of the theatre to examine emotional expression, performances, and tactical displays.

We will begin by briefly reviewing the work of Erving Goffman, the originator of the dramaturgical perspective, who, though he only deals with emotion incidentally, has inspired many later writers in this field. We will follow with a consideration of the work of Louis Zurcher, who has conducted studies of the staging of emotion in organized activities such as college football games and military reserve exercises. The major exponent of the dramaturgical approach, and perhaps the most famous Canadian social theorist, has been Erving Goffman. While studying at the University of Chicago, he encountered Herbert Blumer, among others, and was exposed to the influential ideas of George Herbert Mead. He is well-known for his contributions to the study of total institutions such as mental hospitals, his work on stigma, and his ideas on the "dramatization of evil" which contributed not only to the study of deviance, but to the labelling perspective in particular.

Today, however, we will largely focus on Goffman's main contribution to symbolic interactionist theory, an approach that has come to be known as dramaturgical sociology. Using the metaphor of the theatrical performance, Goffman thus argues that when an individual appears before others, he or she will have many motives for trying to control the impressions they receive of the situation. In effect, each puts on a "show" for the others. Interactants, either by themselves, or in "teams," give "performances" during which they enact "parts" or "routines. According to Goffman, the outcome of each performance is an imputation by the audience of a particular kind of self to the performed character s.

This imputation of self is as much or more a product of the expressive, ritualistic, or ceremonial elements in the actor's behavior as of the substantive, practical, or instrumental elements. As he points out " information about the individual helps to define the situation , enabling others to know in advance what he will expect of them and what they may expect of him. Control is achieved largely by portraying oneself in a manner that influences the definition of the situation , thus leading others to act voluntarily in accordance with one's own plan. Taking a pragmatic perspective, Goffman asserts that in any case where other individuals act "as if" the individual had conveyed a particular impression, he or she has effectively projected a given definition of the situation and the understanding that the imputed state of affairs implies.

In Goffman's analysis, then, the self becomes an object about which the actor wishes to foster an impression. Different aspects of this general theme, first developed in his classic The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life , are found throughout his other works. These include the following:. Goffman's work shares some similarities with other schools of thought in symbolic interactionism. For example, like the Chicago school, dramaturgy traditionally emphasizes sympathetic introspection as its chosen methodological orientation, and rejects the conventional assumption that social roles determine the behavior of Interactants in a simple cause and effect manner. Stressing the calculative and situational behavior of actors, both approaches remind us that norms, positions, and roles are simply the frameworks within which human interaction occurs.

However, like the ethnomethodologists, Goffman recognizes that many significant norms tend to escape notice, because they are taken for granted. Hence, he stresses instances in which norms are violated in order to disclose what they are and how they are maintained. Goffman's predecessors in the symbolic interactionist perspective e. Mead, Dewey, Cooley, Thomas, Blumer, and others gave no extensive consideration to impression management, insincerity, hypocrisy, or inauthentic self-presentations. Indeed, his work rivetted reader's attention to the human capacity for self-reflectivity in a much more compelling fashion than his predecessors. His analysis advances, in effect, a significant reconstruction of the image of human beings offered in symbolic interactionism.

However, Goffman's approach has been criticized on theoretical, methodological, and ideological grounds. For example, with regard to the first two, Meltzer, Petras and Reynolds argue that his work contains:. In addition, we find an insufficiency of qualifications and reservations, so that the limits of generalization are not indicated. Others, such as Collins and Makowsky, question Goffman's notion of the functional necessity of "performances" in the maintenance of social order given the increasing informality of modern interpersonal relationships and the erosion of rank in contemporary American society.

Blumer criticizes Goffman on the basis that he focuses on the "narrowly constructed area" of face to face association "with a corresponding exclusion of the vast mass of human activity falling outside of such association. Essentially, Blumer is arguing that the dramaturgical approach theoretically ignores the macrocosm within which its micro-level concerns are imbedded. Similarly, it overlooks the actual substantive content of human encounters in its concern exclusively with the expressive forms of encounters. According to Blumer, the resultant image of the human condition is a truncated, partial one.

Similarly, Bob Prus asserts that the dramaturgical perspective Goffman presents suffers from its inattentiveness to the ways in which the task or accomplishment aspects of action are conducted on a day to day, moment to moment basis. Once one moves beyond a consideration of the ways in which impression management "looking good" is achieved in interpersonal contexts, Goffman's work is of limited value in appreciating how human activity is achieved in practice.

According to Prus, "to understand how one manages or performs tasks, builds relationships, acquires perspectives, and the like, one must turn more squarely to the symbolic interaction of Herbert Blumer and studies that have been developed in Chicago-style ethnography. Moving beyond matters of theoretical and methodological scope, many also go on to criticize Goffman on more ideological grounds.

Gouldner, for example, emphasizes how modern men and women frequently depend on, and are integrated into with large-scale bureaucratic organizations over which they can have little influence; individuals whose sense of worth and control is impaired, and who thus bend their efforts to the management of impressions that will maintain or enhance status. Gouldner thus characterizes Goffman's dramaturgy as "a revealing symptom of.

Indeed, to many commentators, Goffman's scheme of imagery suggests a sordid, disenchanting view of humans and their society, one marked by both duplicity and despair. Such commentators contend that Goffman's view celebrates both the subordination of reality to appearance and morality to opportunism. Summing up, then, Goffman's dramaturgical approach, with its emphasis on self-presentation and impression management, has made a major impact in a direction that had only been hinted at before.

Nevertheless, it has also been criticized as too narrowly-focused theoretically and methodologically, and as presenting an unflattering picture of human nature. One writer in the study of emotion that has been heavily influenced by Goffman is Louis Zurcher. Yet Zurcher focuses not so much on the Apresentation of self as he does on how emotional performances are Ascripted in interactions.

As such, he pays a great deal of attention to how interactants, either by themselves, or in "teams," give "performances" during which they enact "parts" or "routines. Zurcher most basically argues that Adramaturgically considered, emotion, or more accurately the performance of emotion, is enacted by the individual in terms of his or her understanding of appropriate emotional behaviors in a particular situation. The enactments of different emotional states, while the actors are occupying a particular role or a re experiencing a particular event, are not simultaneously undertaken.

The situation often calls for a series of versatile emotional presentations, sometimes in a programmed order. A specific social situation, depending on how people perceive their place in it, can evoke a remarkable variety of emotional performaces. Without getting too much into the descriptive detail of each of these pieces, I want to elaborate a bit on how each of these are illustrative of the dramaturgical approach to emotion generally. In the first piece, Zurcher reports the results of a participant observation study of the emotional performances of fans, coaches and players at a college football game. He describes the structure of the staging for emotional display, as well as the phasing of people into sets of contextually appropriate performances.

This phasing is seen to evolve from expectation for emotional experience, to diffuse emotional readiness, and finally to specific emotional displays. The staging and phasing are shown to be directed by cue-producing others e. This was a big game for both teams, as it was both a championship game, and a game after which both coaches were to retire. It involved settings such as the field, the locker room, etc. A wide variety of emotions from the athletes, from quiet determination in the locker room before the game, acting pumped up on the field as it was to begin, elation as it finished with a victory, sadness upon the coach saying goodbye, etc.

Similarly, the cheerleaders pumped up the crowd, while the crowd responded differently to the coach emerging after the game in his old training jacket. Zurcher feels that any adequate theory of human emotion should attend thus to the situation which shapes emotional experience and expression. The activities and events associated with a college football game were illustrative of the manner in which sets of emotions can be staged in social collectivities. People can experience a range of emotions in those situations, the extent and intensity of the range being cued by others. Though cue-produced sets of emotions are present in spontaneous everyday life situations, individuals often attend specially structured events in which they can expect to experience a particular set of emotions e.

Indeed, people routinely pay for admission to staged events in which they are directed to display a range of emotions e. The orchestration of emotions in staged events follows a scripted phasing, beginning with the arousal of expectations for an emotional experience. The expectations generate a diffuse emotional state, which is finally directed into a series of discrete and identifiable emotional displays. Among the football fans, the phasing was manifest first in their expectations for an exciting game, then in their expression of spirit, and finally in their emotional reactions during the game. They were directed in these performances primarily by the media, by formal and informal prompters, and by interactions with other fans.

Among the football players, the phasing was manifest first in their expectations for a challenging game, then in their expression of mood, and finally in their emotional displays during and after the game. They were directed in these performances primarily by coaches, fans, and by interactions among themselves. The dramaturgical nature of sets of emotions in such contrived events is typified by remarkable shifts in emotional display within a short time frame - e.