SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper Erving Goffman: The Presentation of the Self And Facebook

Cassandra Dawson 0599587 SOAN 2111/2112 L. Hunter University of Guelph March 22 2013

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper General Introduction Erving Goffman was born in Alberta, Canada in 1922 and died in 1982. He eventually became a professor at the University of California and the University of Pennsylvania (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004). During the mid-1900s the intellectual community was largely focused on their established disciplines and methodology. Sociologists were primarily concerned with systematic analysis of social structures, and taking on a macro-level approach to society (Drew & Wootton, 1988). Due to Goffmans interest of the interaction between individuals he was regarding as somewhat of a social psychologist among his colleagues at that time (Applerouth & Edles, 2007; Drew & Wootton, 1998). While Goffman can be attributed as one of the founders of the work on the self, he was influenced by other theorists of the time, including but not limited to George Herbert Mead, William I. Thomas, and A. R. Radcliffe-Brown who discussed the self with varying levels of similarity to Goffmans ideas (Applerouth & Edles, 2007). General Intents, Purposes, Insights, Core Concepts and Methodology The general intent of Goffmans writing was to contribute to the understanding of the individual self and group behavior as a result of socialization and interaction. He aimed to conceptualize the self, individual perception and presentation of it, and how the performer is influenced by the presence of others and the setting interactions take place. His micro level analysis of how individuals interpret themselves, the world and understand society was very unique from previous and existing theorists at that time. In his view, each person has their own mind and is capable of thought and action (Applerouth & Edles, 2007). He disagreed with many scholars of the time and refused to dedicate himself to one investigative tradition of research (Drew & Wootton, 1988). He found he could best understand the presentation of the self by

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper studying individuals in society in more empirical terms, not ever keeping with one traditional methodology. The important questions Goffman explored were the links between interaction order and forms of social organization (Drew & Wootton, 1988). He wanted to explain the social situation as the basic working unit in the study of the interaction order, which was contrary to many macro-level sociological perspectives of the times (Drew & Wootton, 1988, pp. 4). He was interested in the face-to-face interactions between people, and the practices and procedures people utilize to deal with varying occasions they find themselves in (Drew & Wootton, 1988). He addressed each of the core concepts he used to explain how they influence the presentation of the self. They also address how an actor behaves and is influenced by a given audience through interpreting information to each other about themselves. Goffman (1959) discussed many of these terms in one of her major works titles The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. The common theme throughout the book is impression management which he describes as the attributes requires of a performer for the work successfully staging a character (p.208). As individuals try to convey a certain perception of them, they must also protect aspects of themselves that would limit the intended images effectiveness. In order to describe the process of self-presentation Goffman coined the term dramaturgy, which refers to the performance and tactic an individual takes in effort to display themselves, which is a result of where they are and how the audience reacts to them (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004). It compares the self to an actor on stage, consisting of the front, backstage, setting, and personal front. The front is the aspect of the performance the actor does intentionally and is generally fixed for that particular audience (Goffman, 1959). Meaning for he can be expected to consistently behave in a similar way for that audience. The different fronts an

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper individual takes on can become institutionalized through stereotyped expectations by an exposure to similar settings by similar actors. Such that, witnessing similar individuals behave in a particular fashion in a given setting, can influence the actor to believe this is the appropriate front for that type of situation or setting. These settings, which are geographical and physical, are required for the actor to perform in a particular way (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004; Goffman, 1959). Without the setting, that part of the self is unable to be displayed. In Goffmans view, when a person is within a given setting, expressive equipment may be identifiable and expected to be used in procession the performance (Goffman, 1959). This was referred to as a personal Front. Within a personal front, these items may be attributable to ones appearance, which may convey social status, present activity, season, or lifecycle. A performers manner, however is used by the audience to predict what role the performer is about to take on in a coming situation. Goffman also believed that individuals also often want to maintain a sort of mystification of themselves by the audience. Performers go about this by maintaining social distance between them and their audience, which creates awe, respect, and co-operation by the audience. Such obvious cases are members of authority and royalty where by limiting direct contact with their audience, any weaknesses cannot be detected (Goffman, 1959; Appelrouth & Edles, 2007). As part of the performers impression management they maintain their backstage separate from their front. According to Goffman (1959) the backstage is when an individuals suppressed facts make an appearance, Here the performer can relax; he can drop is front, forgo speaking his lines, and step out of character (p.112). While always with the performer, he is aware he can keep the current audience from being able to access this part of him (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004; Goffman, 1959). There is also a sense of stigma from the audience when there

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper is a gap between a persons virtual social identity and their actual social identity. Sometimes the gap is known to the audience and sometimes it is not, either way tension exists because the individual knows they are being observed. Goffman highlights that some stigmatizations are more chronic than others, such as having depression versus feeling sad, yet we all experience some form of it during our lifetimes. Finally, Goffman found that the presentation of the self is influenced by the importance of rituals. They reflect legitimacy is positions, structures, and social relationships (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004). By complying with socially accepted rituals the individual can affirm himself as legitimate in society and be a member with appropriate behavior (Appelrouth & edles, 2007). Therefore there are significant ways to present the self that will influence the ways in which the actor is treated. Goffman, as an empirical investigator believed in observation and derived much of his theory from everyday experience. He used resources from both scholarly sources, as well as nonscholarly sources to come to his comclusions(Drew & Wootton, 1988). He was generally an iconoclast, meaning he did not enjoy being conventional, which was evident in the way he approached his theories (Appelrouth & Edles, 2007). By moving away from the popular theoretical tradition, his work lacked any clear hypotheses, research designs, or testable theories (Drew & Wootton, 1988). He sought to find the data that had yet to be examined, such as the role of language in social life through means of ethnomethodology (which had not been established as a mode of study) and by using his experience in everyday life (Appelrouth & Edles, 2007). Application to a Contemporary Sociological Issue Since 2004, the social media site Facebook has become a staple means of communication and socialization for about 901 million users (Chen & Marcus, 2012). Almost everyone with

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper access to a computer has their own personal profile in which they are continuously posting pictures, comments, status updates, and sharing personal information via the web. What has become increasingly obvious over the last 9 years is that people share much of themselves online, as opposed to in person. Erving Goffman, who studied face-to-face interactions and impression management, would view Facebook as the new stage in which individuals present themselves to their audience. As a new means of dramaturgy, Facebook allows users to consciously and intentionally provide aspects of themselves to others on the site. As Goffman discussed, Facebook users will engage in impression management by presenting themselves in a certain way that will appeal and be approved of by their friends. By posting only those photos in which they consider themselves attractive, tag themselves with multiple friends in order to appear popular or engaging in socially desired behavior, individuals on Facebook offer up a positive front for themselves. In essence they are displaying the tendency for performers to offer their observers an impression that is idealized in several different ways (Goffman, 1959, pp. 350). They also require Facebook to do so, acting as a physical setting, in which their presentation of the self is accomplished and maintained. Additional, as discussed by Steele, Parker, Telch, Kettles, and Liao (2012) young Facebook users will alter the perception of themselves according to the feedback they receive online, as well as will be more likely to interact themselves. Goffman addresses how individuals are aware that others perceive them and on Facebook adjustments to self-esteem can be a direct result of interaction between the performer and audience (Nadkarni & Hofmann, 2012). Just as Goffman described, each individual is in interaction with others visible to them and are susceptible to interference depending on the feedback and situation (Ritzer & Goodman, 2004).

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper Social status and legitimacy of their Facebook profile can also be compared to Goffmans concept of rituals. There is an expectation to continuously post valued status updates and comment on friends profiles as well. Failure to do so may result in the impression that their Facebook site is not a true representation of who they are, as it could be assumed they have a bigger life offline. Due to Facebook profiles not requiring direct contact between Facebook users, and users can choose to post the best aspects of themselves, Goffmans concept of mystification can be maintained. However, when people are aware of whom these people are off Facebook, susceptibility to sigma is created. It is easy for people in modern to society to behave in ways online that are out of character to what they display when in Face-to-face interaction. Whether or not Facebook is more true to themselves, by keeping the same friends on and offline they may fail to keep their image consistent. This is likely the case because individuals tend to only display their positive-attributes on Facebook (Chen & Marcus, 2012; Nadkarni & Hofmann, 2012), yet the audience may know some faults if they also interact with them face-to-face. The issue with Facebook then becomes whether people are able to maintain a stable self-perception with the people they know on and offline. Regardless, Facebook has become a stage for the presentation of the self, and real-life has almost become the backstage, where aspects of themselves they try and suppress online are revealed. Conclusion Goffman was a revolutionary thinker of his time who stepped out of the traditional and mainstream way of doing research and didnt assign himself to any one discipline. By combining sociological, psychological, and anthropological perspectives to the study of individuals in

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper society he was able to get an in-depth look at human interaction. His insights offered an analysis into how individuals present themselves to others and what can influence differences in behavior across situations. Despite being glorified by many scholars, there is concern regarding his methodology and terminology. Ritzer and Goodman (2004) discussed how his lack of disciplined research techniques makes it hard to classify and code his findings. They also identified that some of his terms, such as self and I are vague and hard to operationalize. Therefore some aspects of his theories would be hard to replicate, due to missing operational definitions and unstructured researching. Overall, Goffmans theory of the presentation of the self allows for a sociological look into day to day interactions in society and emphasizes that people are in fact different in different social settings and amongst different people.

SOAN 2111/2112 Term Paper References Appelrouth, S., & Edles, L. D. (2007). Erving Goffman (1922-1982): a biographical sketch from Sociological theory in the contemporary era: text and readings. Sage Publications Inc, 177-182, 185-186, 188. Chen, B., & Marcus J. (2012). Students self-presentation on Facebook: an examination of personality and self-construal factors. Computer in Human Behavior, 28, 2091-2099. Drew, P., & Wootton, A. (1988). Erving Goffman: Exploring the interaction order. Boston, Massachusetts: Northeastern University Press. Goffman, E. (1959). The presentation of the self in everyday life.Woodstock, New York: The Ovelook Press. Nadkarni, A., & Hofmann, S. G. (2012). Why do people use Facebook? Personality and Individual Differences, 52, 243-249. Ritzer, G., & Goodman, D. (2004). Symbolic interactionism: the basic principles from modern sociological theory, 6th edition. McGraw-Hill, 217-232, 235-237. Steele, A. K., Parker, B., Telch, M J., Kettles, S., & Liao,K. (2012).Online feels better: reactivity to social evaluative feedback face-to-face and on Facebook. American Psychological Association, 1-3.