Goffman Interaction Ritual Essays On Face-To-Face Behavior

There is a structure in human interaction, and Erving Goffman set out to describe it in this 1967 collection of previously published essays.

There is a structure in human interaction, and Erving Goffman set out to describe it in this 1967 collection of previously published essays.

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While the actor may express confidence and assurance (p.

8) when in face, when in wrong face or out of face, the actor may feel dissonance within himself or herself, or may feel shame, inferiority, or may have other bad feelings.

30) At the same time, Goffman does consider various aspects of the player, by focussing on the emotions of the individual embarrassment, shame, pride, etc. Lemert, Charles and Ann Branaman, editors, The Goffman Reader, Malden, Massachusetts, Blackwell Publishers, 1997.

so that he has developed a somewhat better explanation of the inner aspect of the self than have some other writers. 31-3 is the fragility and limits of the self, and how the interaction order has certain mechanisms, check and balances (p.

Beside these cooperative aspects, which derive from a strongly interactional stance (144), Goffman depicts social life as an anxious, embattled experience in which face is constantly under threat and face-saving is the quintessential social skill (31).

In fact, four out of the six essays deal with different levels of breakdown of social ritual, from everyday embarrassment to psychiatric disorders, with a view to demonstrating that ritualised interaction is the backbone of social order.Face arises from the fit between expectations and behaviour: face-work is rule-following, the “ritual” to which the title of the book refers.Performing the ritual incorrectly might cost the actors their face – which is, after all, “only on loan … Goffman portrays face-work in fundamentally negative terms, involving mostly face-saving strategies for avoiding or correcting threats to face – not only our own, but those of our fellow interactants as well, since loss of face is generally an uncomfortable social situation for everyone involved (28).For Goffman, concern for face structures all co-presential behaviour: this he calls face-work, i.e.the effort to align lines with face (12), or simply to act as the person we and other people think we are.“Living up to one’s reputation” is yet another way to put it.The terminology varies, the phenomena stay the same.Following Goffmans observation that there is a certain order and continuity to social interaction, he begins to examine the ways that such interaction proceeds, considering the procedures associated with the interaction order.There are various goals that the actor has gaining an income, achieving friendship, pursuing spiritual values, or pursuing various personal emotional goals and face-saving is not the objective, but rather part of the code or rules that actors use in social interaction.But the actor is not just an individual face necessarily involves others and social interaction, so the focus for the social actor and his or her social self is always on the nature of the 19-23 ritual disequilibrium or disgrace ritual acts with symbolic component worthy of respect face as sacred [as opposed to profane, and separated from profane] interchange = re-establishment of ritual equilibrium lack of effort by one may be met with more effort by others (p. 28) resolution of situation more important than apportioning blame others protect individual eg.