I Had to Grind for This View: The Panopticon, Thomas
Theorem, and Impression Management in Relation to
Contemporary Societal Goals
Katherine Zhang
Department of Sociology, Arizona State University
SOC 340 Social Deviance
Professor Jon Mcqueen
November 19, 2023
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Throughout their daily lives, people often find themselves presenting and expressing
themselves in ways that measure to standards set by both society and their inner narrator.
Attempting to edit the way others perceive themselves has been identified as “impression
management”, a form of social control that individuals ascribe themselves to for the sake of
achieving both societal and personal goals. (Leary and Kowalski 1990). The acts taken to
execute impression management range from excessive personal grooming, selecting elite
hobbies, expressing specific `political beliefs, and more. A part of the process of impression
management is the identification of goals—that which catalyzes the process of controlling one’s
speech, physical appearance, lifestyle, and more. Much of impression management is done
outside of the public eye in solitude but for gratification from non-present onlookers that is
internalized into a concept known as panopticism. Panopticism makes individuals their own
jailors—in that, they assume and embody societal expectations and work for the sake of
impression management even when not being perceived by other individuals. The panopticon—
the complex of being one's jailor that is often present in the internal workings of individuals
enrolled in heavily controlled facilities such as schools and prison complexes—and impression
management go hand.
An illustration of how the panopticon and impression management may intersect is
painted by Jenny L. Davis in her study of the transabled found in Adler and Adler’s text In
Constructions of Deviance. Transabled individuals face a primarily moral argument against their
identity, and thus often engage in remoralization as a face-saving strategy. The transabled
employed personal testimony to shuck off labels of sexual perversion, greed, and laziness and
did so to minimize the stigma of choosing to identify as disabled. They often elect to not use the
wheelchair--which they feel they require to move safely in public—to avoid confrontation on the
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transabled identity (2016). The transabled specifically addressed moral qualms against their
identity because when attacked, online dissenters would choose immoral labels (i.e. sexual
perversion, laziness, and greed) to invalidate the choices of the transabled. In a similar vein, the
transabled described how a few of them, when it came to using their wheelchairs, would choose
not to do so in public even though they were not visibly able-bodied, simply because they felt
they were immoral or inappropriate in doing so. The actions and speech of the transabled
community—a heavily stigmatized group of people who often attract negative attention in public
and online—demonstrate the concepts of panopticism and impression management in their
entirety.
Contrasting these two sociologically intertwined concepts is Thomas theorem—which
states that “If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences” (Scott and
Marshall 2009). Expanding upon this, Thomas theorem proposes that facts are determined by
human perception and can never be absolutes, and that belief in one’s perception in turn
transforms perception into reality by consequence. Once again calling on the example of the
transabled community, the narrative of their face-saving actions changes when considering them
through the lens of Thomas theorem. Using Thomas theorem, it would be discerned that due to
their intense belief in their disabilities, the trans-abled would be mentally frail without the tools
they believe they need to function—wheelchairs, aides, surgery, etc.—thus making them
mentally handicapped.
It is also possible to study impression management, panopticism, and Thomas theorem in
the case of young men and women of color in inner-city high schools and their choices in dress.
Garot and Katz describe how in low socio-economic status (SES) high schools, the youth engage
their identities through their styles in a “strategy of resistance, a general defiance towards a
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philosophy of institutional power” (1990). While high schools ban specific colors in fear of
Latinx and Black students parading gang involvement on campus, non-gang involved students
elect to break those dress codes to rebel against White adults in administration which had
prohibited them from wearing black, blue, and white on certain days to minimize gang activity
involving their students. In the eyes of impression management, students who engaged in civil
disobedience did so to defy the “juvenile” assigned to them because of their race and SES status.
Their choice to wear gang-related clothing was a rebellious choice that pushed against the
assumption of the panopticon that eventually students become their own teachers and hall
monitors in the case of controlled high schools. Conversely, Thomas theorem is enforced here
from the perspective of the teachers. They believed that Black and Latinx students wearing
black, blue, and white, were indicative of delinquency and possible gang involvement, and when
Black and Latinx students choose to do so in response to their control, their views on such
students being “difficult” are validated by such rule-breaking, and thus the color and race
association to delinquency are established as their truths. Carrie Spector adds insight to the depth
of Thomas theorem in this specific situation, as she describes how schools create a “culture of
punishment” against Black students (2020).
Ultimately, the three concepts of impression management, panopticism, and Thomas
theorem intertwine and weave within each other. Different perspectives on the same topic can
call for either or all of them to be addressed and are supposed intangible beliefs that manifest
themselves into reality through the agency and self-fulfillment of their believers.
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References
Adler, P. A., Adler, P., (2016). In Constructions of Deviance: Social Power, context, and
interaction (8th ed., pp. 229–242). Cengage Learning.
Garot, R., & Katz, J. (2003). Provocative looks: Gang appearance and dress codes in an innercity alternative school. Ethnography, 4(3), 421–454.
https://doi.org/10.1177/146613810343006
Leary, M. R., & Kowalski, R. M. (1990). Impression management: A literature review and twocomponent model. Psychological Bulletin, 107(1), 34–47. https://doi.org/10.1037/00332909.107.1.34
Scott, J., & Marshall, G. (2009). A Dictionary of Sociology.
https://doi.org/10.1093/acref/9780199533008.001.0001
Spector, C. (2021, February 5). How school systems make criminals of black youth. Stanford
News. https://news.stanford.edu/2020/06/18/school-systems-make-criminals-black-youth/