Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Brissett, Dennis
• Edgley, Charles

Titel

LIFE AS THEATER: A DRAMATURGICAL SOURCEBOOK (2nd edition)

Erscheinungsjahr

1990

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Sociological Abstracts

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• A collection of essays discussing social-psychological issues from the dramaturgical perspective. While this is a second edition, two-thirds of the material is new & represents the latest thinking & work being done in the field. This vol is published as part of the Communication & Social Order series (David R. Maines, series editor), & presented in VI PARTS containing 23 Chpts, with a Preface & 3 Appendixes. PART I - THE DRAMATURGICAL PERSPECTIVE - provides an overview & a literature review of the dramaturgical perspective, in Critiques of Dramaturgy, & The Legacy of Erving Goffman. PART II - SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS AS DRAMA - offers (1) Peter Berger -- Sociological Perspectives -- Society as Drama -- confronts the question of human freedom, & provides a dramatic view of social life as part of a polemic directed at the more deterministic theories; (2) Nelson N. Foote -- Concept and Method in the Study of Human Development -- applies the dramatic analysis of Kenneth Burke (A Grammar of Motives, New York: Prentice-Hall, 1945) to the social psychology of human development, & argues that human development is the understanding of how episodes of interaction condition each other; (3) Sheldon E. Messinger, Harold Sampson, & Robert D. Towne -- Life as Theater: Some Notes on the Dramaturgic Approach to Social Reality -- see SA 11:2-3/63A4500; (4) Ralph H. Turner -- Role Taking: Process versus Conformity -- explores aspects of George Herbert Mead's role theory (eg, see Morris, Charles W. [Ed], Mind, Self, and Society, Chicago: U of Chicago Press, 1935) in an attempt to show that it is more than simply an extension of normative or cultural deterministic theory, & argues that the concept of role is useful in conceptualizations of social interaction; & (5) Erving Goffman -- Role Distance -- utilizes the example of merry-go-round riders to explain the notion of role distance, discusses role distance relative to serious activities, & explores medical surgery as an activity system. PART III - THE DRAMATURGICAL SELF - continues the vol with (6) Ernest Becker -- The Self as a Locus of Linguistic Causality -- analyzes the symbolic conditions that produce individuality, theorizing that the self is basically a system of language that is essentially in a constant process of modification as one person interacts with others; (7) Erving Goffman -- The Presentation of Self -- discusses the nature of human interaction relative to the presentation of self, arguing that in a two-sided relationship between an actor & his or her audience, a perception of self is created between the two persons engaged in interaction; (8) Gregory P. Stone -- Appearance and the Self: A Slightly Revised Version -- develops the notion that individuality resides in the meaning of one's appearance & thus argues that interaction is basically a process of identification of, & then with, another person, & analyzes the self in terms of four components: identity, value, mood, & attitude; (9) Emile J. Pin & Jamie Turndorf -- Staging One's Ideal Self -- utilizes the example of a modern social gathering to explore how an ideal self is staged & presented before many social audiences; & (10) Catherine M. Watson -- The Presentation of Self and the New Institutional Inmate: An Analysis of Prisoners' Responses to Assessment for Release -- see SA 31:4/83N3201. PART IV - MOTIVATION AND DRAMA - includes (11) C. Wright Mills -- Situated Actions and Vocabularies of Motive -- outlines an analytic model for the explanation of motives, based on a sociological theory of language & a social psychology; (12) Marvin B. Scott & Stanford Lyman -- Accounts -- see SA 16:6/68D3091; (13) Erving Goffman -- Remedial Work -- provides a dramaturgical view of motivation that conceptualizes motives as part of a larger set of interactional problems faced by human beings when they associated with each other; (14) Victor S. Navasky -- The Reasons Considered -- determines reasons why those who cooperated with the 1950s House Un-American Activities Committee & "named names" did so, considers these reasons from the standpoint of C. Wright Mills's concept of motive vocabularies (eg, see "Situated Actions and Vocabularies of Motive," American Sociological Review, 1940, Oct, 904-913), & documents the four predominant motives given by the participants; & (15) Diana Scully & Joseph Marolla -- Convicted Rapists' Vocabulary of Motive: Excuses and Justifications -- see SA 32:4/84O0969. PART V - ORGANIZATIONAL DRAMAS - presents (16) Ronny E. Turner & Charles Edgley -- Death as Theater: A Dramaturgical Analysis of the American Funeral -- see SA 25:3/77I6331; (17) Jacqueline Boles, Phillip Davis, & Charlotte Tatro -- False Pretense and Deviant Exploitation: Fortunetelling as a Con -- applies a dramaturgical analysis of the con game as a form of occupational false pretense among fortune tellers, & determines six routines of false pretense utilized by fortune tellers in their efforts to convert their clients to an occult definition of both trouble & remedy; (18) Deborah M. Kolb -- To Be a Mediator: Expressive Tactics in Mediation -- presents a participant observation study of federal negotiators that shows how structural matters such as rules, procedures, & actual conditions of work are dramaturgically negotiated; & (19) Iain L. Mangham & Michael A. Overington -- Dramatism and the Theatrical Metaphor -- proposes a much broader method from dramatistic analysis, utilizing Kenneth Burke's pentad (act, scene, agent, agency, & purpose [A Grammar of Motives, Berkeley: U of California Press, 1969 (1945)]), & views dramatism as both an interactional analytic technique & a method for assessing theories of interaction. PART VI - POLITICAL DRAMAS - concludes the vol with (20) James M. Mayo, Jr. -- Propaganda with Design: Environmental Dramaturgy in the Political Rally -- employs a dramaturgical perspective to analyze the "successful" political rallies of the Nazis in the days leading up to WWII; (21) Peter M. Hall -- The Presidency and Impression Management -- explains, in an analysis of the impression-management problems of would-be presidents, that the power of the office & the ascension to it are symbolically & dramatically constructed; (22) Joanna B. Gillespie -- The Phenomenon of the Public Wife: An Exercise in Goffman's Impression Management -- discusses the wife as an important sociological component of a leader's political self-presentation, which may be analyzed through examining her role in the husband's impression-management strategies; & (23) John F. Welsh -- Dramaturgy and Political Mystification: Political Life in the United States -- marries a critical Marxist perspective of political life in the US with a dramaturgical perspective, finding that a variety of critical points can be discerned through analysis of the fraud & deceit apparent in the dramaturgy of politics. Appendix 1 -- Kenneth Burke -- The Five Key Terms of Dramatism. Appendix 2 -- Nicholas Evreinoff -- The Never Ending Show. Appendix 3 -- Gustav Ichheiser -- Appearances and Reality. References are provided for each essay. 7 Tables, Bibliog. D. Dennis