Erving Goffman

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• Erving Goffmans
• Presentation of self
• in
• Everyday Life
• Part I Performances Teams
• Presented by Tina Quicoli

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Performances
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• Belief in the part one is playing
• When an individual is playing a part it is
  requested that the audience take their impression
  seriously.
• The audience is asked to believe that the
  character actually possesses the attitudes they
  appear to have.
• At one extreme the individual may believe the
  show that they are putting on. The audience may
  believe their show too.
• At the other extreme the individual does not
  believe in their own routine.
• When the actor does not believe in their own act
  or have concern for his audience they are called
  cynical.
• An individual may be called sincere when they
  believe the impression that they are putting on.

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• At each end of the continuum the individual is
  provided with a position that offers them their
  own securities and defenses.
• People are always playing roles and we know each
  other through these roles.
• A mask represents the conception that we have
  found ourselves. This is the role that we are
  trying to live up to and our truer self, the self
  we would like to be.
• We come into the world as individuals, achieve
  character, and become persons.
• 
  

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• Front
• A performance refers to all the activity of an
  individual that occurs during a period marked by
  their continuous presence before a particular
  audience.
• A front is the part of the individuals
  performance that functions in a general and fixed
  way that defines a situation for the audience.
• The front is expressive equipment of a standard
  kind that is intentionally or unwittingly
  employed by the individual during the
  performance.

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• Parts of the Front
• The setting involves the physical layout and
  other background items that provide the scenery
  and the stage props for the show.
• A personal front refers to the other items of
  expressive equipment that are associated with the
  performer themselves and that we naturally expect
  will follow them where every they go.
• Appearance refers to the stimuli that act to tell
  the audience about the performers social status
  and their temporary ritual state.
• Manner refers to those stimuli that function to
  warn us of the interactional role that the actor
  is expected to play.
• The front becomes a collective representation and
  a fact in its own right.

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• Dramatic realization
• While in the presence of others the individual
  infuses their activity with signs that
  dramatically highlight and portray confirmatory
  facts that might be unapparent or obscure.
• In order for an individuals activity to become
  significant they must mobilize their activity so
  that it will convey what they want during the
  interaction.

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• Idealization
• When an individual presents in front of others
  their performance incorporates the values of the
  society.
• This may be viewed as a ceremony or as an
  expressive rejuvenation and reaffirmation of the
  moral values of the community.
• It is a biased performance that is accepted as
  reality and has the characteristics of a
  celebration.
• The most important form of sign equipment is
  associated with social class and consists of
  status symbols through which material wealth is
  expressed.

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• When an individual performs in front of other
  they conceal more than inappropriate pleasures or
  economies.
• First, they may engage in a profitable activity
  that are concealed from their audience and that
  are incompatible with the view of their activity
  that they are trying to obtain.
• Second, there are errors and mistakes that are
  corrected before the performance takes place.
• Third, the performers only show the audience the
  end product of the performance -- they are judged
  by the finished package.
• Lastly, the performer fosters the impression that
  they have ideal motives for acquiring their role.

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• A performer fosters the belief that they are
  related to the audience in a more ideal way.
• First, the individual fosters the impression that
  the routine that they are performing is their own
  routine or at least their most essential one.
• The audience assumes the character projected
  before them is all that there is to the
  performer.
• Secondly, the performer tends to foster the
  impression that their performance and their
  relationship to their audience are special and
  unique.

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• Maintenance of expressive control
• The performer relies on the audience to accept
  cues that act to signal something important about
  their performance.
• Unmeant gestures may occur during a performance
  and convey impressions that are incompatible with
  the one that the performer is intending to
  foster.
• A performer may accidentally convey incapacity,
  impropriety, or disrespect by momentarily losing
  their muscular control.
• The performer may also act in a way that gives
  the impression that they are too concerned with
  the interaction.
• Lastly, the performer may allow their
  presentation to suffer from inadequate
  dramaturgical direction.

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• Misrepresentation
• The sign-accepting tendency puts the audience in
  a position to be duped and misled.
• We ask whether a fostered impression is true or
  false we really mean whether or not the performer
  is authorized to give the performance.
• The performer has a lot of responsibility and
  power towards shaping and controlling the
  impression being fostered.
• The performer may use their authority and power
  to confuse and confess the truth to the audience.

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• Mystification
• It is possible for a man to work upon others
  through a false idea of their self.
• The audience may sense a secret, mystery, and
  power behind the performance.
• The performer may sense that his main secret is a
  petty one or a folk tale.

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• Reality and Contrivance
• We tend to see a performance as something that is
  not purposely put together, an unintentional
  product of the individual unconscious response to
  the fact in his situation.
• We see a contrived performance as something that
  is pasted together there is no reality for which
  there is a direct response to
• Performers may be sincerely convinced of their
  own sincerity, but this is not necessary.
• An honest sincere performance may have less
  connect to the real world than we actually think.

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Teams
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• A performer guides their private activities in
  accordance to existing moral standards. These
  standards may be associated with a reference
  group. This creates a non-present audience for
  their activities.
• The individual privately maintains standards of
  behavior that they may not believe in due the
  belief that an unseen audience is present who
  will punish deviation from the standard.
• In other words, an individual may be their own
  audience by imagining an audience to be present.
• Then, it can be said that a team may stage
  performances for an audience that is not
  physically present to watch the show.

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• The definition of the situation that is projected
  by a participant is an integral part of a
  projection that is fostered and sustained by the
  intimate cooperation of more than one
  participant.
• The performance team refers to any set of
  individuals who cooperate in staging a single
  routine.
• The concept of a team allows us to think of
  performances that are given by one or more
  performers.
• It is also important to point out that teammates
  work together to form a team impression.

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• Members of a team are in an important
  relationship to each other.
• Teammates are related to one another by bounds of
  reciprocal dependence and reciprocal familiarity
• First, team members are bound by a reciprocal
  dependency, which links them together. That is
  each team member is forced to rely on the good
  conduct and behavior of their fellows, and they
  are forced to rely on them.
• Secondly, in order to maintain a given definition
  of the situation before an audience, members are
  forced to define one another as persons in the
  know. In other words, team members are bound by
  rights of familiarity.

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• One of the teams main objectives is to maintain
  their impression and a consistent definition of
  the situation.
• In order to protect their impression team members
  are required to postpone taking a public stand.
  Once a teams stand has been taken all members
  are obligated to follow. Therefore, teammates
  avoid disagreements in front of an audience.
• In addition, the official word must be made
  available to all teammates so that they can play
  their part. Withholding information from a
  teammate inhibits their ability to assert a self
  to an audience.
• When a team member makes a mistake the other
  members often wait for the audience to leave
  before punishing them.
• Lastly, only individual who can be trusted are
  selected to participate in the team. For this
  reason, children are often not included in teams.

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• A team is a group in relation to an interaction
  or series of interaction that are relevant to a
  particular definition of the situation.
• A team has the character of a secret society.
• The audience is aware of the fact that all
  members of the team are held together by a bond
  that no member of the audience shares.
• Since we all participate in teams we all carry
  within ourselves the guilt of conspirators.

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• Discussion Questions
• 1) Do you believe Goffmans theory is a
  superficial theory of human action or not?
• 2) Is there really a backstage?
• 3) Why is it so easy for misrepresentation to
  take place?