Review of My Life Among the Deathworks: Illustrations of the Aesthetics of Authority, by P. Rieff

Review of My Life Among the Deathworks: Illustrations of the Aesthetics of Authority, by P. Rief

Review of Sidewalk, by Mitchell Duneier

Review of Sidewalk, by Mitchell Duneie

Review of An Invitation to Social Construction

Reviews the book An Invitation to Social Construction, by Kenneth J. Gergen

Credibility, Agency, and the Interaction Order

There are two ways of reading Goffman-as a theorist of trust and ritual accommodation, that is, as a theorist of the interaction order, or as a theorist of deception. I suggest a way of making these two readings compatible, by arguing that Goffman was interested in what I call the production of credibility. Credibility is the quality of being believable, and this quality is integral to both trust and deception. Viewed in this way Goffman explored the ways in which people make their actions convincing to other people. Although Goffman\u27s analysis of the interaction order did not need a theory of the self, his work actually contains two quite different theories of the self: one linked to role analysis, one to his analysis of mental illness. I argue for the latter at the expense of the former. I conclude that Goffman both initiated substantive work about the interaction order and contributed to a synthesis of a theory of the interaction order and a theory of the self

The Evolution of the Concept of Social Action: Parsons and Goffman

Goffman’s analysis of gambling is very important for our overall understanding of his work. This is because Goffman’s sociology is driven by both theoretical and ethnographic impulses, and his gambling project is the third of his three major ethnographic investigations. Goffman’s study of gambling is a key component in his sociology because it (a) develops a conceptual approach to the study of the interaction order, (b) extends Parsons’ and Merton’s analysis of social action and social control, and (c) links the microeconomic analysis of the social world that he associated with Thomas Schelling that has become the mainstay of the analytic sociology

Ritual Talk

The analysis of talk is important for Goffman\u27s examination of the self in face-to-face interaction. Here I suggest that his target is best described as being our ritual talk. Goffman defined ritual in two ways: as the smooth running of everyday encounters and as the honouring of the selves who people them. He suggested that ritual talk is structured by both prevailing rules of social interaction and by the sequential organization of talk. However, on occasion he hinted that this account is too simple. I agree, and suggest ways of furthering his investigations

Review of An Invitation to Social Construction

Reviews the book An Invitation to Social Construction, by Kenneth J. Gergen

Review of Freud on Madison Avenue: Motivation Research and Subliminal Advertising in America, by Lawrence R. Samuel

Review of Freud on Madison Avenue: Motivation Research and Subliminal Advertising in America, by Lawrence R. Samue