SOC 3690 PAPER 1

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SOC 3690 PAPER 1

• Interactionism and Dense Description

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Paper format

• by email, single space,
• put your name on file and top of paper
• place information on setting where, times
  observed

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• Example
• Name Cheng Lam (Rachel 04008472)
• Assignment 1The observation of every day eating
  in a semipublic setting the student canteen
• Date of observation 12th October 2006
• Time of observation 130-230 pm
• Location Hall canteen

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What is the social level we are observing micro
level?

• Study of relationship between society and the
  individual.
• This relationship is central to socialisation a
  life-long process of developing an identity and
  learning to live in society.
• This relationship is dialectic
• Experiences of individuals are embedded in social
  relationships.
• Collective / social phenomena are made possible
  by agency of individuals.

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INTERACTIONISM

• The founding of sociology began in the 19 c. a
  industrialization urbanization and upheaval. We
  constantly go back to our founding questions
  Behind this question is the overall sociological
  problem How does society work? What makes
  society possible? How can we cohere, how is
  interacteraction possible?
• Five crucial things discussed by interactionism,
  a review. How do we know our actions are
  social?
• i) Interactionism aproach is they are social
  because we align our actions with others and with
  aspects of the social structure.
• ii) We symbolize
• By this is meant we do not just do we act
  like actors we hold in our mind the meaning of
  our acts. The meaning includes how we think our
  actions are taken by others.
• iii)We put ourselves in others shoes. We act in
  regard to how we anticipate how others take what
  we do.

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Our orientation in social interactionism

• We do not put emphasis on individual as a single
  person
• Our emphasis is on social structure (institutions
  etc.) in which individuals participate and which
  affect them.
• social causation of behaviour (social constraints
  on individual behaviour, e.g. roles)
• Social Patterning of behavior.

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• How do we know our actions are social?
• i) Interactionism aproach is they are social
  because we align our actions with others and with
  aspects of the social structure.
• ii) We symbolize
• By this is meant we do not just do we act
  like actors we hold in our mind the meaning of
  our acts. The meaning includes how we think our
  actions are taken by others.

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• iii)We put ourselves in others shoes. We act in
  regard to how we anticipate how others take what
  we do.
• iv) We expect continuity of social behavior .
• We learn over time what people will do, so that
  we act in regard to what they have done,
• People recognize what is happening, when it just
  starts, or is about to start, even before it is
  finished. That is, we kind of know what to do in
  a situation, what is done.
• This is learned Children dont know it very
  well, and do things that seem wrong, and we try
  to correct them. Other people that dont act
  properly are marginalized. Put in insane asylums.

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• v) our acts have a pattern
• We know our acts do not inhere in us
  biologically, because they have a pattern not
  random or idiosyncratic
• what is a pattern? behavior varies by social
  groups or categories. These are socially created
  and meaningful groups male/female, social class,
  age., culture, other..
• The ultimate patterns are social roles

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• In sum we are not imprinted on from birth. We
  develop our sense of self through experiencing
  and reflecting our surroundings, but we also have
  our own input. So it is not inherent.
• A number of people we refer to as the
  interactionist school arose to figure out how
  people acted together, rather than apart as
  individuals. George Herbert Mead talked of the
  creation of the "self" as part of society. He saw
  the personality as a system. All parts were
  interrelated, and thought we could not look at
  "needs" "impulses" without seeing the whole
  person in a context. For Mead, the individual
  was reacting to others, and this was the focus of
  Meads study. His real study, then was the
  social group. He began to study what we call the
  mechanics of social interaction. The group is
  incorporated into our mind. We act in regard to
  the group

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The Mechanics of social interaction

• The Mechanics of social interaction
• i) The act Communications as gestures,
  reflexive
• The social act is a process of signaling and
  interpreting signals, giving off conventional
  gestures or significant symbols or signs that
  mean the same thing to both sender and receiver.
• Signaling and interpreting is most crucial in the
  mechanics of interaction because they link people
  together. Unless the signals of one actor are
  responded to by another, and become the basis for
  responses, interaction does not occur. The
  mechanics of interaction revolve around what
  actors do in mutual signaling and interpreting
  In signaling, actors use stocks of knowledge or
  lived experiences. These stocks of knowledge
  operate to shape people's assessment of
  themselves as objects in the situation.

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• In your papers, some few mentioned signals,,

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• We signal Gestures Gestures stand for
  incomplete acts, shorthand
• That is, we do not have to complete every act for
  someone to anticipate what the act will be like,
  if we did have to complete every act, we would
  not get much done, no time. We would be bumping
  into people all the time.
• Examples Imagine someone reaches hand to you
  with a rope. That is a gesture, it is not
  complete, you have to interpret it. Is it a
  threat? Is it a game? Is there something you
  want? If you bring the tope to a dog, it may see
  it as going out gesture and will excited. If it
  sees you as trying to tie it up, the dog will
  resist the stimulus of the rope. If people see a
  rope, there are similar interpretations some may
  resist being tied up unless it is explained as a
  game, a sexual encounter, or in a ship
  interpreted tied up for own safety. Definition
  of situation is most important concept of
  symbolic interaction.

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• The significance of gestures is that they
  represent a completed act, but are not carried
  out to the conclusion. You see the gesture and
  try to understand its meaning. To do so, you
  place it in a framework that is known to you. You
  interpret something. Someone else can interpret
  the same thing pretty much like you, if they are
  part of your social world. If they are from a
  different social context, such as a different
  country, different social class, they might get
  it differently from you.
• Example shows --People don't respond to stimuli,
  People act towards things on the basis of the
  meanings that things have for them.
• --The meaning of such things is derived from or
  arises out of social interaction one has with
  one's fellows
• --meanings are handled and modified through
  interpretive process used by the person in
  dealing with the things he or she encounters..
• The group of the person the social rol affects
  your interpretation of the gesture , you place it
  in context

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• --The meaning of such things is derived from or
  arises out of social interaction one has with
  one's fellows
• --meanings are handled and modified through
  interpretive process used by the person in
  dealing with the things he or she encounters..
• The group of the person the social role affects
  your interpretation of the gesture , you place it
  in context

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• "Significant symbol" Actors have to respond to
  each other for meaning to emerge and they are
  able to do so because each takes the necessary
  steps to ensure that they announce their
  intentions verbally and gesturally so that the
  announcement would elicit needed responses.
  Dramatize their meanings and create a social act.
  
• We note importance of communicative interaction,
  through communication by gesture and language,
  one can signal to others ones own subjective
  attitude w/o going through the entire act which
  the gesture signifies. The gesture is the
  expression of the subjective attitude and a
  vehicle for expression of emotional response. It
  is not the direct expression of responses, only
  in the social process that gestures can become
  signs which are significations carrying meanings
  of all members of social group.
• Gestures and signals are things we do all the
  time Bodily movements, demeanor. Even spatial
  arrangements of people. dress codes, are all
  symbols that are codified gestures. They are a
  form of positioning as defined by others. in
  conventional terms.

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• Gestures and signals are things we do all the
  time Bodily movements, demeanor. Even spatial
  arrangements of people. dress codes, are all
  symbols that are codified gestures. They are a
  form of positioning as defined by others. in
  conventional terms.
• Many symbols to let on how people see each other
  and with whom, and what you expect from them,
  there are Clothing styles

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• These are paramount in making a statement about
  whom we are. They gain currency from our group
  activity
• Remember I mentioned we study social interaction
  and social life as alignment? Why are gestures a
  kind of alignment? They make a statement, they
  are intended to make this statement, and they
  depend on others to interpret the statement.
• Ongoing interaction with others Helps create our
  social identity

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• We literally do not know what we are doing, or
  even what or who we are except in terms of the
  responses of others that give meaning to our acts
  and define us to ourselves. That is how people
  put it the self is a reflexive product of social
  interaction. Social relationships are not simply
  stimuli for thought, but are actually
  internalized and incorporated into our self
  concept. In the process of thinking, we
  experience "team work in the mind".
• Mead called this adopting the standpoint of the
  other vis a vis oneself, and ones actions

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• The responses of one individual to the gestures
  of the other in a social act are the meanings of
  the gesture. Meaning is not a state of
  consciousness or a set of organized relations
  existing outside the field of experience meaning
  has its existence entirely within the field
  itself.
• Taking the role of the other, allows the person
  to align actions with those of others, and
  incorporate social control into actions,
  introspectively This emphasized actor's routine
  orientation to social control in everyday actions.

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• Significant others There is multiple
  positioning, people need not be present to be in
  our mind. Cooley coined the term the looking
  glass self as a way of balancing the different
  ways people see us in the mind.

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• Graphically Alice has bought a hat, she tried on
  the hat in front of a mirror and saw herself in
  the hat, thought she'd look good to others.
  Bought it. When she wore the hat she saw herself
  as someone who others see as wearing a hat that
  looks pretty good. This is a "power hat" , you
  wear it when you want to be "big". The others
  might see even envy the hat wearer as someone
  that can command a lot of attention. She then
  sees herself as looking like someone that others
  see commands a lot of attention, and she began to
  act as if she has a lot of power and presence.
  Maybe she adds a cape, others respond to her like
  she sees herself which is seeing herself as
  others might see herself. In this way the self
  takes meaning from others' views and responds as
  such, it is recursive.

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• Social roles Codifications of social positions
• Stocks of social knowledge are roles. We cant
  constantly reinvent what we have to do, so these
  become expected in the wider society, in the
  common sense of every day life. They are
  maintained by common expectations of order. Most
  of us have many stocks of general knowledge as to
  how we should act. We call these social roles.

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• Our meaning of self includes drawing on what is
  expected from us from performing roles we hold.
  Since roles have structures, we know how to
  respond to others because of knowing how roles
  are structured. But we have to learn roles.
• Further these roles are not static. They are
  constantly acquired because our life changes and
  so does others around us. We have to adopt new
  roles and change our roles. That is why we stress
  adult socialization in this course. Finally,
  roles are often in conflict.
• Roles are not stamped on us. Even as we learn a
  social role, we learn through the process of
  signalling and interpreting. These are basic
  acts of alignment that link people together,
  One's acts become basis of others' acts,
• Different roles are associated with different
  performances. we work on understanding how we act
  as social selves rather than self contained
  individuals,

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• Consider how many roles you have
• how many from same groups,
• any role conflict

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Symbolic interactionism 3 levels

• Symbolic interactionists differ in relative
  importance they assign to individual agency and
  social constraints on behaviour, respectively.
• Distinguish micro, meso, macro. Most analyse
  social causation at a micro-social level
  (Goffman meso-social).
• Symbolic interactionism as sociology of everyday
  life. entails looking at essential connections to
  other people.

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• We are always in social relations. We are born
  into existing social relations at birth, and
  remain part of networks of other people
  throughout our lives. If we feel isolated from
  others it can be understood as how we are
  connected to them, We see humans in terms of
  relations w. others. Even individuality is
  socially based.

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• The basic tenets of interactionism are that we
  create our sense of identity and meaning about
  social life by drawing on the interpretations of
  others around them, especially those people that
  are meaningful to us. We also create meaning by
  an active problem solving approach. We try to
  figure out what is going on around us in a
  pragmatic way. This is a problem based learning
  approach that takes a lot for granted. Finally,
  we stage our stance by announcing it in a
  dramatic manner.

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Inductive method in qualitative field work

• Goal of social-psychology research is to make
  grounds of social interaction explicit (make the
  familiar unfamiliar).
• Starts with the assumption of naiveté nothing is
  known about the experience (no theories).
• It then assumes membership stance the
  standpoint of population under study.
• Some researchers assume stance of an outsider a
  distance from the populations standpoint offers
  unfamiliar interpretations of the phenomenon.

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• First assignment
• This is a dense description of interaction in a
  setting, based on inductive observation recorded
  in field notes.

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Choosing your setting

• Can you see the familiar with fresh eyes?
• Can you understand the unfamiliar?

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Field notes

• Write field notes unobtrusively while in the
  setting, complete them as soon as possible.
• Field notes should be
• Detailed
• Concrete
• unselective

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Field notes

• Detailed
• The tall, white muscular male in his late teens
  sprinted into the brightly lit room just as the
  short, overweight black woman in her sixties
  eased into a battered chair.
• is better than
• One person entered, another sat down.
• Quote directly.
• If helpful, make maps, diagrams

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Field notes

• Concrete
• Keep description separate from inferences (ideas,
  hunches, remarks about regularities, routines)
• This is a way to keep an open mind, I.e. to allow
  multiple interpretations.
• Marking your notes might help
• ON observation notes
• MN methodological notes
• TN theoretical notes
• PN - personal notes

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Field notes

• As unselective as possible
• Allows multiple interpretations.
• Beware of advance judgments about what is
  important and what is not.

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Writing field notes

• In the field participating, observing and
  jotting notes. Be unobtrusive.
• If helpful, give people nicknames (speeds up
  writing).
• At the desk complete your notes as soon as
  possible.
• Never substitute a label for a description
• (e.g. girlish, macho)
• Never substitute an inference for a description
• (e.g. aggressively, struts around)

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Dense description

• The difference between complete field notes and a
  dense description is only in structure and in
  relative emphasis on description and inference.
• Suggestions for structuring dense description
• Physical description
• Dialogue
• Sketch
• Episode
• Tale

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Dense description

• Be comprehensive, discuss everything about a
  topic,
• Be detailed. Give information from your
  observations so that a person not there can see
  it through your eyes.
• Topical (of interest to the project)
• As unselective as possible

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Dense description

• As unselective as possible, to allow multiple
  interpretations.
• It does NOT contain the observers attitudes and
  judgments, but it describes what is actually
  happening.
• E.g. describe actions of a woman with a child.
• Do not write She was a good mother.

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Dense description

• Rich in detail about
• Setting (size, lay-out, condition of objects
  signs sounds and smells)
• People (count, categorisation by age, gender,
  other characteristics physical appearance)
• Activities (arrivals, departures, motion, speech,
  non-verbal communication)

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Find a theme without it is boring

• Tell a sociological story from what is going on
• three examples of lineup in supermarket is
  example of story telling

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LOOK FOR THE FRAME

• GOFFMAN DESCRIBES CONCEPT OF FRAME WHAT IS GOING
  ON IN THE MIND OF THE PARTICIPANTS? DEVELOP
  EXPLICITLY THE IDEA OF THE LOCALE AS SETTING THE
  THEME, THAT FRAMES WHAT THEY DO AS NATURAL, AND
  WITHIN WHICH IS THE VARIATION

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• EXAMPLE of Frame
• Canteens are quite different from other kinds of
  eating places like cafes in shopping malls and
  restaurants on the streets, though they are both
  in public and serve a main function eating
  Even among canteens, different locations of
  canteens would have different pictures.

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• How to do it
• Set it up 1 paragraph, or sentence

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Example of theme social differentiation

• The physical setting of the hall canteen
  indicates that this is an open area in popular
  style. There are two entrances which located in
  the two ends of the canteen to facilitate
  peoples coming. The floor standing windows let
  customers and outsiders see each other easily
  and make the canteen not too private. Unlike
  some other restaurants, no one would be there to
  welcome the customers as well as to filter out
  any outsiders. The tables and chairs in the
  canteen are in the same kinds of those in other
  places, like classrooms in the campus. This
  feature shows that the canteen is the popular one
  for people in all classes, not only for
  upper-class or middle-class.

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BUT Theme social differentiation

• Others pointed out there were differences in
  group behavior
• eg. price differences
• and people impose their own differences
• they group together, creating insiders vs
  outsiders how can you describe that?

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• Other themes
• time time pressure

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Theme of Time

• When Freddy arrives at the canteen, he has felt
  disappointed as usually. There is full of people
  in the canteen and difficult to seek a vacuum
  seat. Although there are about 60 tables and 450
  seats in the canteen, which are more than other
  fast food shop, it is always over-crowded and
  people are difficult to find seats during the
  peak hour, which is roughly from 1145 am to 200
  pm.
• Worse still, there only 2 or 3 persons are
  responsible to the Chinese dish counter, however,
  they are also responsible to the drinks.
  Therefore, it is the busiest sector during the
  lunchtime. The Chinese noodle counter has 1 or 2
  employee and they would shift with the employees
  in the Chinese dish counter. There is a chef and
  usually an employee in the western and Italian
  food counter. The in-kitchen is not seen openly
  from the canteen, except the window between the
  in and out kitchen. There are about 4 or 5 chief
  in the in-kitchen. In sum, there are only about
  20 employees serving more than 600 customers at a
  time.
• Finally, he buys a bowl of Yun Nan noodle in 15
  after waiting 3 minutes

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THEMES Why eat there?

• HOME AWAY FROM HOME
• finding friends, being recognized
• less work to do always know what you want to
  order
• Cosmopolitanism Chinese in Hong Kong feel
  comfortable eating variety of Western/Chinese
  food
• McDonalds vs STARBUCKS example

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• Theme 3 HOME AWAY FROM HOME
• Welcome. What do you want? the cashier said. She
  was a lady with long hair being tied up. (She had
  been working in the canteen for at least 4 years.
  When I was in Year 1 and Year 2, I lived in the
  hall and went to the canteen very often. She knew
  me and sometimes we would chat for a while when I
  am buying the food).
• The rice noodles cooker was busying to cook and
  receiving our ticket. She knew me. She sometimes
  called me handsome boy and we might chat for a
  while when she was cooking).

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• Conflicting images
• decent meal
• vs the canteen food is expensive and unhealthy.
  It does not make sense to have so many people in
  a small canteen!