Week 9: Symbolic Interaction, Identity, Goffman

C&S: Cooley 151-155, Mead 156-160; C&S:  Stretesky & Pogrebin 173-181, Adler & Adler 210-218; C&S: Goffman 191-199

Who are you? Who am I? These are things that everyone considers and tries to figure out as they grow up and go through life. But Mead, Cooley, and Goffman developed several theories on how we figure that out. Mead talks about the generalized other and how, through stages of interaction, we learn who we are in comparison to others. According to Cooley, our sense of self and identity is developed through interacting with others and judging how they see us and applying and taking on that self that we imagine others see us as- this is called the looking glass self. We judge how others see us by responding to their reactions of us to help form who we think we are. Goffman theorizes that the self is created strictly though specific interactions and performing different selves. We try to display a certain self and give off a specific identity through identity management in this dramaturgical theory. In identity theft scams, such as the one found on http://www.bclocalnews.com/news/133770963.html, people try to give off the impression that they are a specific person in order for their own gain. The person in this article behaved like the lady’s granddaughter and did what she could to essentially be her over the phone in order to get money from the grandmother. This front-stage interaction wasn’t entirely successful because the grandmother was suspicious and refused to send money, but the grandmother did nearly believe it was her granddaughter on the phone because they sounded very similar.