(Goffman's Dramaturgical model)
A. The Dramaturgical Model
1. All the World’s a Stage
2. The Performance
B. Impression Management
1. The Definition of the Situation
2. Expressions and Impressions
3. Front Stage, Back Stage
4. Accounts, Excuses, & Justifications
5. Self Enhancement and Ingratiation
6. Self Awareness, Self Monitoring and Self Disclosure
A. The Dramaturgical Model
Erving Goffman is probably one of the most important sociologists in relation to the self. His book--Presentation of Self--remains an important book in this field.
Goffman's approach is sometimes referred to as the dramaturgical model.
1. All the World’s a Stage
From As you Like It;
All the world’s a stage
And all the men and women merely players.
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages;
At first the infant, mewling and puking in the nurses arms;
And then the whining schoolboy with his satchel
And shining morning face creeping like a snail
Unwillingly to school;
And then the lover, sighing like a furnace with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow.
And then the soldier....
And the justice....
The sixth age shifts into the lean and slippered pantaloon
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice
Turning again toward childish treble
Pipes and whistles in his sound.
Last scene of all, that ends this strange eventful history,
In second childishness and mere oblivion
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
2. The Performance
Our life, in this model, is simply a series of performances. While I am standing here, I am engaged in a performance in which I am trying to convey not only information about Goffman to you, but information about me through the confidence in which I speak on the topic, the manner in which I do so; the mastery of speaking in