If you'll remember, I have complained in the past about people not hiding their true feelings enough. No one wants those around them to be completely genuine, trust me. You don't want to know what others actually think about you.
Goffman believed that all the world is a stage (perhaps Shakespeare was a Sociologist as well). He talked about the Dramaturgical model of Sociology, where every action is a performance for others or ourselves.
"In a public space, the individual appears to be indifferent to the strangers in his presence; but actually he is sufficiently oriented to them so that, among other things, show he feel the need to perform corrective rituals, he can transform the strangers around him into an audience to receive his show."-Goffman
Goffman said that the sincerity of a performance has to do with how much the actor believes his own portrayal of himself. Some performances are "cynical" ( example: a person lies about being rich or pretends to be a hot teenager over the internet), some are "mixed performances" (for example, we think we are an attractive person but we flex a little to make sure that others notice), and some are sincere ( a student who really is interested in learning and takes very detailed notes in class).
One day while writing his dissertation, Goffman studied a restaurant. He noted that the back of the restaurant filled with dishwashers, cooks, and waiters was very different than the front of the house where the customers would sit. The kitchen area was filthy, the cooks foulmouthed, and the waiters who were so polite to the guests while serving them food, made fun of their speech and dress among themselves.
Goffman concluded that it is very important it is to have a front stage and a back stage.
The frontstage is where you give your performance, with the proper demeanor, props, language, and clothing.
The backstage is where the illusion is openly constructed. As anyone who has ever been in a play can tell you, backstage is nothing like the frontstage during a play.
We try and keep the backstage and frontstage from ever meeting, because the result, according to Goffman, is embarassment.
We've all experienced this: when a friend finds out we were talking about them, when a customer accidently walks into the kitchen, when someone reads something that wasn't meant for their eyes, when we spot a celebrity without makeup.
It is out duty as decent human beings to try as hard as we can to keep these two stages separate! I'm very aware that not everyone is an awesome actor and that sometimes people's frontstage is not very convincing, or they just decide, "Hey, I can't help feeling they way that I do, I'm just gonna let it all hang out; what have I got to be ashamed of?"
Well to them I say: for the same reason the waiters don't go out to the patrons of the restaurant and say, "I think you're wearing an ugly dress today, madam." Because it's RUDE.
While yes, to a certain degree you put on a show for self preservation (you would get fired for saying that), it is also in order to spare other's feelings!
So according to Goffman, we should not strive to be genuine. In fact, a society where everyone is genuine is where all social interaction breaks down.
3 comments:
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First of all, what an interesting idea. The private sphere is the backstage, the public sphere is on stage. The "dramaturgical" model of society is kind of blowing my mind right now. I can't wait to pick out my costume for the day and decide what role to play!
I love what you're saying about how it is anti-social to put one's backstage behavior on stage. So sincerity is just a matter of having your heart in your role, not pretending like you're backstage when you're actually in public.
What you said reminded me so much of a famous passage in Sartre's "Being and Nothingness" about a waiter in a cafe. The waiter is too solicitous, his personality is basically blank. The waiter, Sartre notices, is *playing* at being a waiter. He is pretending he's happy to see you, that he wants to serve you, and that he's got no thoughts or feelings besides.
Sound familiar?
The problem, according to Sartre, is that it's almost impossible for anyone to be different than the waiter, to be "authentic", that is, to just be what they are. I think that's partly because of the nature of human action. Doing anything involves the fallible processes of introspection about your thoughts and feelings, judgment about how you want to behave, and execution of your best laid plans. Add it all up and the best you can do is try to portray yourself well--to "act like yourself".
What's most interesting to me is this idea that even at our most sincere we are still never able to just *be* ourselves; we're always acting like what we think we are, or should be, or want to be.
Take the sincere student. Why does her authentic self manifest itself in diligent note-taking? Is she not, in a way, merely playing a student, because that's the way she sees herself or wants to see herself? She surely doesn't find the subject all *that* interesting. Surely she doesn't feel like going to class *every* day. She surely doesn't think *all* the professor's jokes are *that* funny. In a way, she's decided that she wants to be a student, and now she's doing her best to play that role. It may be sincere insofar as she really wants to be a student, but it's not authentic--she's not *being* a student, she's just acting like one!
In this same way, the lawyer plays at being a lawyer, the president at being presidential, the mother at being motherly, the lover at being a lover-ly (I couldn't resist), the composer at being an artist, and so on. Every single role that we play is one we've chosen to play because we think it will make us happy or get us what we want or it's what we are supposed to do. And there can be no action or behavior at all unless we've first chosen which role we want to play.
I guess that's probably what you're saying (or Goffman is saying) about the difference between cynical and sincere portrayals--that even a sincere portrayal (the student) is still a performance, still a matter of playing a character.
But then what's the real difference between backstage and on stage? I mean, it seems like the backstage behavior is just as much a performance as on stage! There are just different roles to be played. Backstage we're playing our private roles and onstage we're playing our public roles.
If so, then what's actually anti-social is playing private roles in a public setting or vice versa. But there really is no such thing as a backstage if that's supposed to be the place where we are our authentic selves. *ALL* the world is a stage, indeed!
Exactly, the student is sincere, but Goffman makes it clear that she is still putting on a sincere performance.
She believes she is a good student so she behaves like a good student behaves, it's sincere because she completely believes herself in the role.
It is impossible not to be putting on a performance when there are others around. The funny thing is people who "don't put on a performance" and pretend to be genuine are STILL putting on a performance. They're acting like they don't care about what others think. The problem is that it is rude and transparent; they show their insecurities.
Goffman refers to all others as the audience. So yes, backstage is still a performance, for yourself or a select few who you let backstage. If you think about backstage at a play or restaurant, there are still roles to fulfill and a part to play, it is just a performance for a smaller group of people.
Another interesting aspect of Goffman's theory is that an audience has to accept your performance for it to work. We have all seen bad actors; people who try to assert their intelligence but are unconvincing, for example. These people are so annoying! If you can't put on a convincing cynical performance, stick to something closer to a sincere performance!
It seems that there are two ways to flip the script: 1) to be oblivious to what role one is supposed to play, which is usually considered anti-social, and 2) to play the wrong role intentionally, which is also usually considered anti-social.
But is it necessarily anti-social to flip the script? I'm thinking about transgender performers in particular. Sure, they refuse to play the gender role they've been assigned. But is that necessarily rude?
It's funny because everyone is both audience member and performer in this model. It sort of reminds me of improvisational jazz or improv comedy.
For a while I've thought about politics in a very similar vein--as a drama of competing charismatic personalities in which victory has little or nothing to do with so-called issues. I think about it like that mostly because of Camille Paglia's column for Salon, which you might enjoy. Here's an excerpt from one of her recent columns that I think you'll like:
"As I was recently jumping out of my car to grab a falafel sandwich in South Philadelphia, I stopped dead with one foot on the curb to listen to Justin Timberlake's voice coming over the radio. It was "Cry Me a River," a song that seems just as painfully evocative as it was at first release seven years ago, in the wake of Timberlake's romantic breakup with Britney Spears. In fact, the song has gained tragic power because of Spears' later psychological travails and humiliating career decline -- from which she may thankfully be emerging.
After I got home, I pulled up the video of "Cry Me A River" from trusty YouTube.com and was transfixed. Directed by Francis Lawrence and with a cameo by ace producer Timbaland, it's a mini-masterpiece of brooding Euro-decadence. Timberlake stalks a sinuous blonde Britney look-alike with tortured voyeurism, prancing through her moderne house with dreamy skateboarder moves. His revenge: implanting her TV with a sex clip of himself and a hired gamine skank. Despite the window-breaking violence and obsessive psychopathology of the part he plays, Timberlake, especially in tight close-up, is superb at conveying profound emotion."
As you can see, Paglia is in some ways a kindred spirit of yours--someone with keen intelligence who takes pop culture very seriously!
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