SOCY1004 - The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Erving Goffman)

This is the SOCY1004 assessment task video:
Group:
Jamie Graham
Janika Chalkiadis
Marcus Farmer
Katie Economos


Erving Goffman believed that “We are all just actors trying to control and manage our public image”. The clip you just watched was intended to examine and explore Erving Goffman's theory of the presentation of self in everyday life.
Presented within the context of a university student preparing for and being interviewed for a potential job the clip explores the relevance of goffman's theory within day to day life.
The video primarily explores the individual, called katie preparing her ‘face’ for the interview through a clear juxtaposition between “front region and back region behavior”
Goffman's dramaturgical metaphor of social performance helps to support our understanding of what is happening in the clip.

Goffman’s notion of ‘face’ explains the characterisation individuals give themselves when in different social interactions. This was clearly represented through Katies two interactions, one with her friend, and the other with her interviewer.

There was a clear difference in both spoken and body language. Highlighted most prominently through Katie high fiving her friend, but shaking the interviewer's hand.

Again, Goffman's ideas of frontstage and backstage were clearly shown in the clip.
With Frontstage being: “a period marked by his continuous presence before a particular set of observers” which was shown through the interview
Abd backstage Backstage: a place That illusions and impressions are openly constructed.,where a team can run through its performance - which was shown through katies preparation in her room.

Finally, Goffman mentions embarrassment, that being the emotional manifestations occurring when someone does not know how to behave, and their face fails.
The incriminating photo of Katie causes her embarrassment, but again Goffman identifies ways of dealing with embarrassment, one being turning it into a joke.

The dramatisation highlights how Goffman's theory of the presentation of self in everyday life is relevant to most of our social interactions and can indeed be applied to our life at university. The clip highlights Goffman's concepts of face and facework, front and back stage and also embarrassment to show that, even during the most normal of days, we are still manipulating how we look towards others.