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Sociology 1001 Fall term 2014 Reading guide #3 The Symbolic interactionist perspective RECAP A few problems with the ‘normative’ approach to understanding social life Although Parsons’s explanation of the ‘social invidual’ may be commended for at least attempting to account for the ways in which individuals act socially, a number of criticisms were quickly raised about the efficacy of this approach. Dennis Wrong argued that such an account gives an oversocialised conception of human behaviour. -That is to say, the problem with structural functionalism is that there is little room for

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people acting creatively, or differently than what the norms allow. -this approach also leaves little room for people having disagreements or conflicts -It also doesn’t suggest any means by which new generations can introduce new ways of acting which are quite different than that of the older community. -Perhaps an easier way of making this point is by remembering that within any society, we always find groups who are not only different, but who play a much more active part in creating for themselves a sense of ‘solidarity’ with each other, -and this may not necessarily come from the common value system current throughout the whole society.

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-And this sociological perspective comes out of Chicago in the early 1920’s -Chicago is very very different than Harvard, Massachusetts at that time -Chicago is full of recent immigrants, all living in their own mini-societies So the suggestion that there is a ‘common value system’ among all these different immigrant groups does not make much sense. -so sociologists in Chicago came up with a different model One which stressed the fact that (mini-) societies are made by people choosing to associate with others that they can feel comfortable with (eg ones they can communicate with easily; eg fellow Italians) -and that they choose to do this

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-In other words, these sociologists looked for a sociological model which stressed the fact that individuals CHOOSE to act within society, and in that process, often create new, or at least different forms of society. This approach differs from the ‘normative approach considerably. -It is called the ‘interactionist approach’ -it has its roots in trying to understand what was happening in Chicago (with all the different immigrant groups) -but also tried to come up with a sociological model which would help explain this type of behavior. And this model is called ‘symbolic interactionism’

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2.Symbolic interactionism – the importance of shared meanings -When we look around at our contemporary social lives, it is quite common to find many people inhabiting and living in groups which are ‘different’ from any easily identifiable sense of ‘shared norms’. -For example, we can look at all sorts of subcultures and other groups who don’t seem to share the same common value system as society. Eg ethnic groups (living in different parts of different cities, or different regions of a society) Snowboarders Jocks preppies Goths Punks chavs

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-In fact, some people might go so far as to say that ‘society’ is actually comprised of all these different groups leading a plurality of different social lives, who make up society, but don’t necessarily share a common value system or share in a ‘consensus’; but they netherless tolerate each other. -Whatever the truth of that matter, we can safely say that we see groups around us which seem to cohere together in a social way, but which don’t necessarily follow a society-wide common value system. -Yet this social activity is very meaningful for them (Italian-Canadians, Polish-Americans, skiers, jocks, etc., etc) -So this leads us to a quite different approach to the study of the ‘social individual’ than the normative approach put forward by Parsons – the ‘symbolic interactionist approach.

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-From this perspective, social life gets created out of the 'meaningful interaction' of humans acting together. (and perhaps entire societies get created like this; Think of the Pilgrims who came to Plymouth rock in 1620) SYMBOLS A cross Red Crescent $ Golden arches The ‘swoosh’ Crown of thorns Peace sign Hammer and sickle Maple leaf Three stripes

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LANGUAGE Её дебютный альбом «…Baby One More Time» сделал её всемирно популярной, а одноимённый сингл возглавил чарт Billboard Hot 100. Первый альбом Бритни содержал пять мощных хитов. Вторая пластинка Спирс «Oops!… I Did It Again» вышла весной 2000 года и только закрепила её статус поп- звезды. Её третий альбом «Britney» вышел осенью 2001 года, а следующий — «In The Zone» — осенью 2003 INTERACTION People talking and conversing with one another So for the symbolic interactionists, society is produced by like-minded people choosing to come together, interacting socially, and producing their ‘society’ through such interactions.

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HOW SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM UNDERSTANDS THE SOCIAL INDIVIDUAL The symbolic interactionists also disagree with the structural functionalists about how the ‘individual self’ operates in society as well Remember for the structural functionalists, the social individual is someone who has internalised the ‘norms’ of society; and then goes about following them. When we look at the ‘social individual’ in symbolic interactionist theory, we see a quite different perspective. So let us take a look at the ‘self’ as understood by symbolic interactionists

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Symbolic Interactionism & the Self SI is very concerned with the notion of the 'self' And the self is understood as a social process (rather than a psychological entity) -One of the first people to grasp this ‘social’ (rather than psychological) notion of the self was Cooley and his notion of the looking glass self -That is, we get an understanding of our “Selves” from the reflection we get back from the people we interact with socially. -And this develops over time, through social interaction. So for example, we may project an ‘image’ of our self to other people,

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We will then wait for their reaction to this social ‘self’ we put forward, We will then adjust, change reject (etc) that ‘self’ based on these reactions Although this gets taken for granted most of the time, in certain social situations, we pay very careful attention to this ‘social process’ eg First date (expectation/anxiety/euphoria- depression) Or a Job interview However, it is important to realise that not all people are equally influential. Cooley said that our sense of self mainly comes from the influence of significant others, such as family members, and others close to us.

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Mead's notion of the 'self' Is a slightly more sophisticated version than Cooley’s and has had much more influence, for a number of reasons. Like Cooley, for Mead the formation of the self is a social process Mead's two part notion of self The I -the spontaneous aspect of self, the acting subject here one experiences oneself as a subject The Me - The socialised aspect of self, the sum of many internalised social attitudes & expectations here one experiences oneself as an object What is important for Mead is the realization that at one moment the 'I' can quickly turn

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That is, the spontaneous acting ‘self’ which surprises you because you did something that you had never done before, etc. can, over time, become the ‘me’, when that spontaneous aspect of your self, the I, becomes routinised, and thus unsurprising. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM AND THE NOTION OF THE SELF - AN EXAMPLE BECOMING A MARIJUANA USER - BECKER 1953 Prior to the symbolic interactionist studies, sociologists and psychologists had understood people who smoked marijuana as people with some type of ‘criminal’ or deviant pathology. However, after studying people who experimented with mariuana, Becker came up with a very different explanation.

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Becker said that individuals 'create' themselves as marijuana users, socially, through their (symbolic, ie through their use of language) interaction with others. -they create a social 'self' which sees itself as a marijuana user (or not - if that person chooses not to become a marijuana user) - Notice here how Becker wants to keep central that emphasis on voluntariness and choice which is the hallmark of the symbolic interactionist approach. Thus what Becker says we must do is examine that social process which people participate in to become a (possible) marijuana user This is done through interaction - people don't do it by themselves

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And people have to learn a new language for describing their experiences and themselves. ie they 'become' this new self via the use of symbols (language primarily) He carried out this research by spending a lot of time with marijuana users to learn their subculture. And then he wrote an ETHNOGRAPHY describing his results. Specifically, he studied and interviewed 50 musicians (jazz) HIS MAJOR RESULTS 1. Showed that becoming a marijuana user is a social process (rather than a pathology), which can be studied and that it 2. is a process which involves choice and human agency constantly (external social factors do not CAUSE you to become a marijuana user) The process

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people 'become' marijuana users (ie they create a self which sees itself as a marijuana user) by choosing to follow all of the steps outlined below (but of course, people can choose to stop at any one of the steps and not continue) If this complete process occurs, a transformation of the 'meaning' of marijuana occurs to this person, and s/he self- identifies as a marijuana user a. learning the technique (this can only be done in a social context with other more experienced users) take in a lot of air, you know, and … I don’t know how to describe it, you don’t smoke it like a cigarette, you draw in a lot of air and get it deep down in your system and then keep it there. Keep it there as long as you can b. Recognising the symptoms (hunger, rubbery legs, different conceptions of time - all of these

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symptoms are not obvious to the novice; they have to be learned socially) -they were just laughing the hell out of me because like I was eating so much. I just scoffed [ate] so much food, and they were just laughing at me, you know. Sometimes I’d be looking at them, you know, wondering why they’re laughing, you know, not knowing what I was doing. -[Well, did they tell you why they were laughing eventually?] -Yeah, yeah, I come back “Hey, man what’s happening?’ Like you know, like I’d ask “What’s happening?” and all of a sudden I feel weird, you know. “Man, you’re on , you know. You’re on pot [high on marijuana]. I said “no, am I?” Like I didn’t know what was happening. c. Learning to enjoy the effects as pleasurable (initial reactions include insanity, fear, distortions, panic) thus the novice must learn to re-interpret these sensations ‘symbolically’ as pleasurable

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-well, they get pretty high sometimes. The average person isn’t ready for that, and it is a little frightening to them sometimes. I mean they’ve been high on lush [alcohol], and they get higher that way than they’ve ever been before, and they don’t know what’s happening to them. Because they think they’re going to keep going up, up, up, till they lose their minds or begin doing weird things or something. You have to like reassure them, explain to them that they’re not really flipping or anything, that they’re gonna be all right. You have to just talk them out of being afraid. Keep talking to them, reassuring, telling them it’s all right. And come with your own story, you know: “The same thing happened to me. You’ll get to like that after a while.” Keep coming on like that: pretty soon you talk them out of being scared. And besides they see you doing it and nothing horrible is happening to you, so that gives them more confidence. If this complete process occurs, a transformation of the 'meaning' of marijuana occurs to this person, and s/he self-identifies as a marijuana user

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THE PRESENTATION OF SELF IN EVERYDAY LIFE A slight variation on the symbolic interactionist perspective was developed by a Canadian sociologist called Erving Goffman at about this time as well. Although it was concerned with how the ‘self’ was created symbolically and through interaction, It used a THEATRE analogy to develop this approach Just like the actor on stage is concerned with putting on a certain act and creating and presenting a certain “SELF”, Goffman’s early work developed this idea in interesting ways. That is, he pioneered what is called the DRAMATURGICAL model of social life.

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Here he was interested not so much in the creation of self, but in the presentation of self. That is, he was very acutely aware of all those social aspects of our behaviour which make up our daily symbolic interaction, and which allow us to present a coherent face to the world. Thus he talked about IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT, how you behave differently, how perhaps you dress differently, based on what the social circumstances are: so that you can manage the impressions you want to convey. And he especially talks about our front stage and our back stage. For example, when we're on stage we try to put forward a certain image. Going for a first date, - what do you do to convey just the right impression.

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Shall I be casual, shall I be formal, Should we go to the movies, what about dinner, what about a bar? But we also need a backstage where all the preparations for this can occur. This presentation of self also needs SCENERY. Just as the effective actor on stage needs props and scenery to help him convince the audience, we too in our everyday social life, need scenery and props to convey the desired impression. Eg a car, house, office etc may all work as appropriate scenery for the self we want to display. OF course, Goffman was also sensitive to the fact that we not only intentionally give

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impressions, but we may be unintentionally GIVING OFF IMPRESSIONS. Thus, people at weddings may appear confident and happy, but then they may be pacing, or they may be wringing their hands, or there may be a little facial tick which gives the game away. Goffman was also interested in the daily minutiae of everyday life eg CIVIL INATTENTION when you're walking down the street, or the way that people studiously ignore others in an elevator. In fact, as we will see the notion of ‘face’ – as something to be saved or sometimes destroyed – is very important for Goffman But oftentimes these roles are carried out with other people and we are actors playing our roles together, or more likely we are improvising.

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Thus he also talks of the importance of TEAMWORK, for example, at a company when it is just the employees around they goof off, when a customer comes in they all work together as a team to put on a united front. CAR RENTAL But of course, if members of your team are not onside with you, then there may be the problem of destructive information. BEYONCE? Typically, this occurs when somebody responsible for back stage preparation gives information out which is supposed to stay in the background. But instead, that person gives out this information, with the usual consequence that it has a destructive element to it for the person being discussed.

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So the early Goffman was very much concerned with this PRESENTATION OF SELF, So to summarise the Symbolic interactionists (and the Goffman scholars to some extent, as well), in one sentence, one might say that the symbolic interactionists take very seriously the following phrase first proposed by W. I. Thomas "If men define the situation as real, it is real in its consequences" Revised 23rd September 2014