On Mon, 12 Feb 1996, Jon Epstein wrote:
>
> 1) Does a theater metaphor really work for describing social reality?
> Is Goffman's sociology "empirical"?
>
Goffman himself indicated in _Presentation of Self_ that it was a
handbook, not an absolute. Without any ambiguity Goffman wrote in _Frame
Analysis_, "All the world is not a stage - certainly the theater isn't
entirely." From this I must conclude that Goffman recognized situations
in which the metaphor would not work for describing social reality.
It just so happens that I am delivering a paper on that very topic in a
couple of weeks. I use the Native American Powwow as the stage. In the
case of powwows the metaphor works far better at describing what is going
on than any other theoretical orientation that I am aware of. I think the
question is not whether Goffman's sociology is empirical, but rather
whether empirical methods can be applied to Goffman's theoretical
orientation. This of course leads to the question as to whether
Goffman's theoretical orientation is really a theory or whether it is a
method.
just a few more thoughts
Richard