Homework Assignment (due on 7/8 11:59pm)

Your answers should be 4-6 sentences, depending on the question. Include page numbers in your responses so that you can refer back to the reading during the discussion or when asking questions. 

Questions for Goffman (1959), The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, pp. xi-xii, 1-58, 70-76: 

1. According to Goffman (1959), how do individuals who are interacting with one another achieve and maintain a common definition of the situation?

 2. Define the following terms: performance, part, and audience. How are these concepts related? 

3. What is the setting and the personal front of performances? 

4. What did Goffman (1959, p. 35) mean when he says that performances often present an “idealized view” of the performer and/or situation? What is an example of idealization in the reading? 

5. What did Goffman (1959) mean by the terms maintenance of expressive control and unmeant gestures? What is an example? 

6. What did Goffman (1959, p. 75) mean when he wrote “To be a given kind of person…is not merely to possess the required attributes, but also to sustain the standards of conduct and appearance that one’s social grouping attaches thereto”? 

7. Think about how Goffman’s dramaturgical theory can be used to analyze your everyday life. What is a part that you play on a regular basis and what are the various elements of your performance of this part?