“The Great Stage of Human Life” – Philebus
Main theorist of the
Dramaturgical Theory
 Schooled in symbolic
interaction theory
 Extended Mead’s basic
insights by viewing everyday
human behavior as distinctly
dramatic, or theatrical
 His works include:
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› The Presentation of Self in
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Wood (2004)
Everyday Life (1956) (1959)
Behavior in Public Places
(1963)
Relations in Public (1971)
“Role Distance” (1961)
“Where the Action is” (1967)
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Developed theoretical insights into the drama
inherent in routine social life
 Skillfully observed and theorized how people
perform in everyday life
 Once wrote that “it is social situations that
provide the natural theatre in which all bodily
displays are enacted and in which all bodily
displays are read.”
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› Emphasizes Goffman’s focus on how physical, or bodily,
actions are used per formatively to craft and project
impressions of individuals and to define the nature of
particular situations.
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His theorizing provides a basis for understanding human
interaction in everyday life
Wood (2004)
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Extended metaphorical description that explores
social world as if it were a theatrical
performance
› We all hide behind a set of masks
 Questions the idea of personal identity
 Tom Burns compares it to a Russian Doll- a series
of selves, one inside of the other (B106-107)
 Similar to Goffman’s Game-theory
› We all play a game in which we attempt to
strategically outwit our rivals for personal gain
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Kenneth Burke
› Grammar of Motives and Permanence and
Change
 Behavior and the motives behind them
Marcel Mauss
› Linked the theatrical analogy with ritual (b109)
Victor Turner
› Tied dramaturgical expressiveness and the ritual
meanings it utilized (b109)
Lévi-Strauss (b110)
› The Savage Mind
 Ritual has a reconciling and reunifying function
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Acronym developed by Philip Manning
based on Goffman’s teachings
› Attempts to specify broad
assumptions people use in social
interactions
Situational Propriety
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Meanings of actions are derived
from the context in which they are
used
Must have knowledge of situation
to understand behavior
Types of Contexts
 Encounters- single focus of
attention
 Social Occasions-event justifies
existence
 Social Gatherings- loose
groupings
 Social Situations- broadest
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Involvement
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Accessibility
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Capacity to give or withhold
proper attention to the activity
Being accessible to friends and
strangers
Keeps us as members of a
common social world
Ex- common courtesies such as
telling the time or giving directions
Civil Inattention
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Willingness to be seen
A sign of deference
Respect we give to and owe from
strangers
 Ex- avoiding eye contact in an
elevator
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This model relates
ordinary social
interaction to theatrical
performance
 The setting, or context, of
interaction is viewed as
a stage
 The people who are
“acting” are actors and
those who are
“watching” are the
audience
 Everyday humans are
performing as if in a play
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Wood (2004)
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Performances
Team
Region
Discrepant roles
Communication out
of characters
Impression
Management
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“All activity of a given participant on a given
occasion that serves to influence in any way any
of the other participants” (40)
 In order to be successful, actors must convince
audience that their performance is reality
 Must be “idealized”- put in the best light,
compatible with cultural norms and values
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› Can also be “negative idealizations”- worst light
“Mystification”- maintaining a distance from the
audience to appear more interesting
 Are often misrepresented because symbolic
ideas can be easily persuaded
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› Ex- forging a birth certificate to pass as aristocracy
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Difference in tone and intensity distinguishes
stage acting from “acting-out” (which goes
on in everyday conversation
 “Front Stage”- a set of stereotyped
expectations
› Props, appropriate facial expressions, role
attitudes
 “Back Stage”- time and space for the
preparation of procedures, disguises, and
materials
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Wood (2004)
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Successful performances are usually
done by teams
 Can be compared to as secret societies
 Run by Directors
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Wood (2004)
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Perform in “Front Regions”
› In order to succeed, there must be an
agreement between the team and the
audience that what is portrayed is actual reality
Rehearse in the “Back Regions”
› Space to rehearse, where disguises and
materials are stored (b112)
A “Guarded Passageway” connects these two
regions
› Ex- Funeral Parlor
These regions allow teams to keep secretes
Wood (2004)
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People with these roles try to gain access
to team secretes by pretending to be
part of the team
 Attempt to gain access to backstage
 Most have a right to access this area but
abuse the privilege for their own gain
 Examples- informer, confidant,
colleague, mediator, servant
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Wood (2004)
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5 types of secretes that teams have
› “Dark Secrets”- incompatible with team’s
image
› “Strategic Secrets”- what the team plans to
do
› “Inside Secrets”- identify a person as a team
member
› “Entrusted Secrets”- demonstrate
trustworthiness
› “Free Secrets”- disclosed without discrediting
team performance
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Performers disclose information that damages their
face
4 Forms of out-of-character outbursts
› “Treatment of the absent”- involves
uncomplimentary role-playing or terms of
reference
› “Staging Talk”- meant to assure others that
everything went well
› “Team collusion”- allows the audience to have a
special relationship with the team
› “Realigning actions”- recourse to humor
 Ex- saying “it was a joke”
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Avoid projected self to be confused with
a presented self
 Depends on audience to limit any
interactional damage
 “Wild Card”- adding uncertainty to the
conversation
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Wood (2004)
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The process of managing setting, words,
nonverbal communication, and dress in an
effort to create a particular image of
individuals and situations
Our efforts to create and project certain
impressions may be either highly calculated or
unintentional – Goffman (1959)
We may be highly strategic in crafting an
image but unaware we are creating an
impression
Many believe it is manipulative and deceitful
› It can be, however, deceptive and unethical
Wood (2004)
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Ways We Manage Impressions
in Everyday Life
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Women remove hair
from bodies:
Look as though you are
paying attention in class
to get the approval of a
professor
 Hiding your accents in
front of people
 Dressing professionally in
front of professors and
not in front of family and
friends
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› Legs
› Underarms
Act differently when with
friends, then with family
 Professional interactions
and personal
interactions
 Drinking straight from the
carton when at home,
but when in front of
others using a glass
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Wood (2004)
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“Embarrassment and Social
Organization” (1965)
We are guardians of faceto-face situations
Motive is to protect social
situations
We project a self that has
positive social value
› Known as a person’s
“face”
Protecting our “face”
makes us monitor our
actions
Face-work “makes our
actions consistent with out
projected selves” (g39)
› Maintained through
avoidance or corrective
actions
 The result of face-work is a
“ritual equilibrium”
 Embarrassment occurs when
a projected self is not
maintained
 Loss of face occurs when the
projected self and the
actual self does not
coordinate together
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Models we rely on to make sense of
experience
We rely on frames to define situations for
ourselves and others
We learn frames through interaction with
the generalized other, or society as a whole
Members of a society or a social
community share many common frames for
interaction
Typically reflect cultural knowledge
› Vary from culture to culture
Wood (2004)
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Role- represents routines or modes of behavior
appropriate to specific social positions (b 107)
Comprised of
› inventiveness and improvisation
› Meaningful content- posture, movements,
gestures, wording
 Learned by imitation, practice, and
experience
› Stamina, timing, and judgment
Wood (2004)
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Levels of euphoria are based on contextual
norms
An inappropriate level can indicate a “faulty
person”
“Euphoric” Occasions
› When exchanges run smoothly with minimal
embarrassment
“Dysphoric” Occasions
› When exchanges are “derailed” due to
Wood (2004)
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Lack of Clarity… Does “Life is Drama” as a metaphor explain this
theory thoroughly?
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Wood says, “Bruce Wiltshire (1977) argues that theater use as a
metaphor, but limited as a description of social life and interaction
among people”, (2004, p.124).
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Bruce Gronbeck argues if the Dramaturgical model fits more into
Art or Science, (1980).Gronbeck also points out that the
Dramaturgical Model can be used in many diverse fields of studies
like; Political Science, Sociology, Criminology, Psychology, Mass
Communication, Anthropology, and Psychiatry; therefore,
“exploring the dramaturgical perspective [can] generate lawful
relationships that can perhaps be molded into full-blown scientistic
theories,”(Gronbeck, 1980, pp. 315-16).
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Gronbeck, B.E. (1980). Dramaturgical theory and criticism: The state of art (or science?). The Western
Journal of Speech Communication, 44, 315-330.
Wood, J. (2004). Communication theories in action: An introduction (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA, Wadsworth)
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Front Stage/ Back Stage
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David and Cheryl Albas
(2007)say that, “front
stage/back stage is considered
‘the game’, and it is used to
bring out the fun aspects of
encounters,” (p. 554).
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“Goffman turned away from
interactional concerns (the
traditional focus of sociology)”
to focus on how people
interpreted different events and
situations, “which may have
different meanings (a dispute or
a joke) by ‘applying the
relevant frame’,” (C, Albas, & D,
Albas, 2007, pp. 554-55).
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Impression Management
› Barry Schwartz (1981) claims
Goffman never analyzes the
authenticity of one’s
performance; therefore,
“performances rather than
purposes become
problematic,” (p. 201).
› “Interaction thus becomes a
matter of managing
impressions,” (Schwartz,1981,p.
201).
Albas, C.,& Albas, D. (2007). Cognitions, emotions, and identities. Contemporary sociology,
36 (6), 553-555.
Schwartz, B. (1981). Review. The American Journal of Sociology, 87 (1), 201-204
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Critical Assessment of
Dramaturgical Theory
People find this theory both accurate
and useful
 Metaphor or Reality?
 Lacks clarity
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› Whether is claim to offer a metaphor for life
or a factual description of life
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Bruce Wiltshire (1977) argues that theater
is useful as a metaphor is limited as a
description of social life and interaction
among people
Wood (2004)
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Criticism Continued
Too Speculative?
 More speculative than empirical
 An Interest Group, Not a Theory?
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Wood (2004)
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