Goffman and the online world
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Transcript of Goffman and the online world
Who?
Erving Goffman ‘22-’83 Important, long-lasting impact Field work mid-century in Shetlands Became interested in micro-sociology
What’s happening in the kitchen
Goffman describes the offline world
Social interaction: “that which uniquely transpires in social situations—in environments in which two or more individuals are physically in one another’s response presence.”
Situation: “any physical area anywhere within which two or more persons find themselves in visual and aural range of one another.”
Framework
The stage Helps understand what’s happening Belief in the role one is playing Impression management
Character is the process added to individuals to turn them into persons
Masks Status
Setting: the spaces are controlled Appearance: non-verbal communications Manner: also shows status and comfort
Framework
Dramatic realisations In the present of others, there are signals and
signs Dependent on setting Members stress their habits and routines
Idealisation Individuals incorporate and exemplify officially
accredited values Our own intentions are idealised: we think we
are meeting society’s expectations
The debate: Is Goffman’s framework still applicable to the online world?
The stage Status Dramatic realisations Idealisation
Comparison of different views on the contemporaneity of Goffman’s ideas
Knorr Cetina (2009)
• Globally-oriented interactionism challenges Goffman‘s approach
• Mostly based on researching global foreign exchange market
Bullingham & Vasconcelos (2013)
• Goffman‘s orginial framework is still applicable to the online world
• Based on research in the context of blogging and second life
Knorr Cetina (2009)
• Globally-oriented interactionism challenges Goffman‘s approach
• Mostly based on researching global foreign exchange market
Rethinking central assumptions of Goffman
Global situations (e.g. foreign exchange market) change forms of the Goffmanian interaction order
New concepts needed to explain global situations Synthetic situation: People received by machine (phone
etc); no co-location Time transaction: Asyncronous
Globally-oriented interactionism abandons assumptions of Goffman Physical presence Focus on human interaction and human mutual monitoring Local focus of a situation
What constitutes global andsynthetic situations?
Global situations are synthetic situations... “that include electronically transmitted on-screen projections that add informational depth and new response requirements to the “ecological huddle” (Goffman 1964:135) of the natural situation”
Synthetic situations are defined as…“an environment augmented (and temporalized) by fully or partially scoped components—in which we find ourselves in one another’s and the scopic components’ response presence, without needing to be in one another’s physical presence.”
In-depth look at synthetic situations
Different types of synthetic situations involve different systematics of reciprocity, accountability, rule-governedness etc.
Features of synthetic situations Informational (perhaps less contextual, more on the matter at hand) Temporal nature Symbolic interaction partners (participants interact through symbolic
‘faces’ of both individuals and also the ‘collective’ as a market)
The synthetic situation’s response system Response presence: we are responsible for prompt responses Intensity: strong mental and physical connectedness (swearing) Preparedness: the capacity to respond reflexively, automatically
Territoriality of copresence vs. temporal aspects of interaction
“When interactions migrate online, for example, the interacting parties meet in time rather than in a place; for that reason, response presence becomes important, and temporal rules of coordination begin to matter”
Goffman’s idea of time supposes that consequences are not immediate. The casino gambler’s later regret Today: scopic systems let us see data, which capture
outcomes. Ultrasounds assess the fateful categories.
Why global situations are not agglomerations of encounters
“Institutional interactions require, specify, and develop temporal coordinates connected to the substance of what these institutions do—a point not lost on Goffman and other interactionists and microsociologists who have analyzed institutional spheres” E.g. A global currency market cannot be
explained with Goffman’s original framework
Bullingham & Vasconcelos (2013)
• Goffman‘s original framework is still applicable to the online world
• Based on research in the context of blogging and second life
Goffman’s framework is of valuefor understanding online identities
Online environments provide their users with the potential to perform and present
different identities can be seen as stage whereas the offline world is the backstage Avatars are used to emphasize or minimize certain aspects of
the self Multiple use of avatars reflects Goffman’s idea of adopting
multiple identities in everyday life Bloggers might mask their identities
Methodology Semi-structured interviews with participants who were either
bloggers or SL users Grounded Theory used for data analysis
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Themes emerged &research findings
Expressions given Females express their feminity using various methods Appearing to be fun vs. appearing professional People display different graduations in expression
Embellishment as minor form of persona adoption Storytelling going back in time
Dividing the self Only some aspects of the offline self are presented online Some parts are emphasized, some are minimized (‘partial masking‘)
Conforming and ‘fitting in’ Bloggers do not feel the same pressure to conform as SL users do
Masking, anonymity and pseudonimity Fear
Presentation of self in the onlineworld is in line with Goffman‘s ideas
People are keener to recreate their offline selves online than to adopt a different persona
Disparity between offline and online selves is minimized
Implications for research
Is the ‘managed’ online persona authentic
Is the ‘managed’ online persona any more or less authentic than the offline one?
Find out more
Christian Hampel, Johannes Gutenberg University of MainzDuncan Chapple, University of Edinburgh
Erving Goffman’s work on the Presentation of Self in Everyday Life inspires a sociological and psychological approach towards the construction and materiality of actors’ behaviours. Through a series of interviews with industry analysts in the information technology and telecommunications industry, we develop a conceptualisation model that relates impression management in two contexts: “pitch” meetings (the formal oral presentations to analysts which are a primary input to the research process), and the diffusion of analysts’ insights (where successful research impact is subject to both oral and online self-presentation).
4pm March 31, UEBS
Resources
Knorr Cetina, K. (2009). The Synthetic Situation: Interactionism for a Global World. Symbolic Interaction 32, (1): 61-87
Bullingham, L., Vasconcelos, A.C. (2013). ‘The presentation of self in the online world’: Goffman and the study of online identities. Journal of Information Science, 39 (1): 101–112
Analogy: the stage
Helps understand what’s happening● Belief in the role one is playing
o Asking observers to take you seriouslyo Ask them to accept players’ attributes
● Character is the process added to individuals to turn them into persons
● Masks
StatusGrowing concerns about what status means.● Ascribed by others, achieved by self, masterKey concepts● Front
o Setting: the spaces are controlledo Appearance: non-verbal communicationso Manner: also shows status and comfort
Interesting to consider, for example, selfies, or gendered settings like doctors and nurses
Dramatic realisations
In the present of others, there are signals and signs● Dependent on setting● Members stress their habits and routinesOn a mass setting, these provide infrastructre for “the fantasies of a nation”● What habits does facebook give stress
to?