![]() ![]() ![]() The focus on the importance of symbols in building a society led sociologists like Erving Goffman (1922–1982) to develop a technique called dramaturgical analysis. For example, while a conflict theorist studying a political protest might focus on class difference, a symbolic interactionist would be more interested in how individuals in the protesting group interact, as well as the signs and symbols protesters use to communicate their message. Their studies often involve observation of one-on-one interactions. Social scientists who apply symbolic-interactionist thinking look for patterns of interaction between individuals. Janitors are shown protesting in Santa Monica. If you love books, for example, a symbolic interactionist might propose that you learned that books are good or important in the interactions you had with family, friends, school, or church maybe your family had a special reading time each week, getting your library card was treated as a special event, or bedtime stories were associated with warmth and comfort. Mead’s student, Herbert Blumer, coined the term “symbolic interactionism” and outlined these basic premises: humans interact with things based on meanings ascribed to those things the ascribed meaning of things comes from our interactions with others and society the meanings of things are interpreted by a person when dealing with things in specific circumstances (Blumer 1969). George Herbert Mead (1863–1931) is considered a founder of symbolic interactionism though he never published his work on it (LaRossa and Reitzes 1993). ![]() Theorists Herman and Reynolds (1994) note that this perspective sees people as being active in shaping the social world rather than simply being acted upon. Communication-the exchange of meaning through language and symbols-is believed to be the way in which people make sense of their social worlds. Symbolic interactionism is a micro-level theory that focuses on the relationships among individuals within a society. Sociological Paradigm #3: Symbolic Interactionist Theory ![]()
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