ANTH 303 Anthropological Theory Fall2017
Oct. 5: Performance and culture: READ: Goffman, Erving (1959). “The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life”. p. 17-25. From The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (New York: The Overlook Press, 1959) : http://crossculturalleadership.yolasite.com/resources/Goffman%20%281959%29%20Presentation%20of%20Self%20in%20Everyday%20Life.pdf

The following questions will help guide our discussion as we try to make sense of this, and other, theories. In addition, we will apply the theory to the video shown in the first day of class.

How can this theory be seen as a product of the historical period in which it was created?
What questions does this theory ask?
What information does this theory see as important?
What are other relevant assumptions made by the theory?
How does the theory analyse this information to answer the questions it sees as important?
What are the strengths and weaknesses of this approach?

Some key concepts from Goffman
- performance (therefore, compares to theatre)
- expressions given, expressions given off: what does one say about oneself? What does one convey about oneself in other ways? What impressions do others get from someone, whether that person intended those impressions or not?
- first impressions
- importance of information one already knows about another or about the context
- notes role-related behaviour, both related to a role an individual holds (therefore, what behaviour do others expect of the person) and to how an individual might lay claim to a role by behaving in ways associated with that role.
    - thus, some similarity to Durkheim in seeing individual as constructed/constrained by socialization
    - agency and structure
- some behaviours are honest and others are contrived.
- thus interested in interactions between people: how one behaves to others, how one responds to others’ behaviour [symbolic interactionism]
- elsewhere researches how people deal with stigma: visible and invisible; discredited and discreditable
- total institutions
- note that this deals with how individuals are expected to interact in a society, so about detail rather than about larger comparative questions about how societies operate.

Applying Goffman to the video:
What is this “stage” or context like?
What impressions does this woman want others to have of her? How is she projecting herself? What techniques does she use?
How do you actually perceive her? What are the things she does, or what is in the context that reinforces her performance or undermines it?


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