Commenting On Ethnomethodology

This week I commented on Brooke's post about "Making sense of the senseless"

You can find that over here:

http://bea091.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/wk7-garfinkel-alice-in-wonderland.html?showComment=1348680249646#c7069958649771674844

The Land of Stages - Dramaturgy

All these "stages" are making my head spin. 

According to Goffman, we're all a bunch of liars, who act out our daily interactions and hide our actual selves behind a smoke screen of fake smiles and misleading gestures. We haven't spoken a word of truth from the moment we learned how to speak.

Okay, so its a bit dramatic when you put it like that.

Some of the points stand, though. We're all actors when it comes to social interACTion, (see what I did?) and we play differing roles depending on the context and surroundings we're confronted with. 

This leads us to split ourselves between two different stages, very similar to the idea of the "me" and the "I" in Representation of the Self. The backstage is where the puppetmaster resides, what may be seen as our true self pulling the strings of mediation and restriction to control the dummy which dances about on the front stage, being judged by all those who come in contact with it; attempting to uphold social conventions, and be accepted within the social norm.

It's important for us, as individuals, to be accepted in society. We like to have a culture we can relate ourselves to. Many see the idea of conformity as a negative in today's society, something that plagues individuals and forces them to meet the expectations of those around them- and I'm one to agree with (conform to) this point of view, there comes a point where we can conform too much, but Goffman's idea of the front/back stage, and our lives as performers is one that has been around for centuries. It's by no means a new idea, nor is it one that implies that the way we live our lives is wrong. The way I see it, this reading was merely an observation.

Presentation of the Self

So now we're down to business, and Presentation of the Self is the first cat out of the proverbial bag.

The "Self" is an interesting concept, and in modern society it can almost seem more like a label than anything else, a way of describing an individual on a completely superficial level. If you think about how most introductions start- when you're introducing your "self", there's a certain pattern that discussion normally follows:

"My name is..."

"My age is..."

"My occupation is..."

And if the person is particularly good at feigning interest:

"My hobbies are..."

So on and so forth until you finally recognise that they stopped listening a long time ago.

But is that really all our "self" amounts to? It seems like such a lofty and intangible concept being compressed into an unreasonably simplified, restrictive structure, if you ask me.

We all know that isn't all there is to it though. Beyond our introductions, we all hold up a social facade of sorts so we can be deemed as acceptable to those around us. To fit in with the norm, we bend over backwards, we adapt, we say things we don't mean, and choose not to say things we do mean. All of this complex meandering around one another is something that's handled on a subconscious level, and we rarely notice that we're doing it.

So how the heck does that work? How do we know what we should and shouldn't say? What does it mean if someone else doesn't follow these conventions, will we shun them? It's a lot of questions, but they're all relevant. The reasonable way of thinking about it is that we all learn these skills via our parents, and other individuals who assist in the formation of our sense of self. We're taught manners, we're constantly told 

"We don't *insert action here*"

And just like that we learn how to present ourselves. It's not an overnight process, but during our formative years this skill is practiced and perfected without any real notice on our part. It certainly doesn't take any conscious effort, in fact 'effortless' might be the best way to describe the entire ordeal.

So the next time you're introducing yourself to someone, and you have a nagging urge to tell them all about how you've been following them everywhere for the past couple of months, remember that such an obsession isn't socially acceptable, and you're better off keeping that to yourself- because that's the norm.

Introduction

Alright, so this whole blogging fiasco seems outrageous to me, as I've noticed seems to be the case with a lot of people, so that's comforting. I'm just scribbling down my train of thought as a form of introduction to this blog and all the sure to be exhilarating and challenging discussion that'll take place here over the next 7 weeks I believe it'll be.

I'll add a blog post with some substance sometime soon to kick off this outlandish adventure!

How do I end this? Saying thanks seems unfounded... Best wishes? Ah whatever.

Linden.