Notes on: Stebbins, R (2013). Role
Distance, Activity Distance, and the Dramaturgic
Metaphor. In C Edgeley (Ed) : The Drama of
Social Life: A Dramaturgical Handbook,
Edition: 1st, Publisher: Ashgate,
pp.123-136 On;ine version
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259502789_Role_Distance_Activity_Distance_and_the_Dramaturgic_Metaphor
Dave Harris
This is going to lead to a discussion of the
dramaturgy metaphor, and extend it to include
activities in general rather than just role.
Role distance is probably the 'most original and
insightful' of Goffman's insights (1). But it has
been 'logically vague and ambiguous'. The original
definition is actually not that helpful, and we
need to collect other elements to make it more
coherent. It develops in line with the status of
identity and role expectations. People can
disassociate themselves from these expectations if
they threaten 'self – conception'. This is
assisted by audiences or others who criticise the
role player ('reference others', page 2) for
enacting the expectations. It is not a refusal to
play them out but rather 'an adaptive strategy,
whereby the performer can more or less fulfil the
role obligations while maintaining self-respect'.
There may be a difference between attitude and
actual behaviour.
There can also be a difference between major and
minor role distance. Major refers to 'highly
threatening expectations' associated with a
prominent identity. Minor ones can involve
appearing 'trivially different from
others...[eg] Liking expectations generally
defined as boring, difficult, or physically
uncomfortable'. These identities can occupy a
'salience hierarchy' within a total set of
identity and statuses, and these can be
situationally rearranged. Stebbins has use the
term 'true role distance behaviour' where
expectations are genuinely disliked and this is
clearly signalled, while 'false role distance
behaviour' involves an impression that an actor
holds an attitude of distance while being
'attracted to the expectations'.
One application talks about behaviour before
customers, trying to get them into the store, but
here the customers are 'not reference others' and
therefore not used to convince the employee of the
need to repair self-esteem. Stebbins himself has
repaired some of these inadequacies, including
those by Ford, Young and Box (1967) [J Ford -- on
schools] who argue that you need skills to step
outside the rules, and many 'lower class people'
are content to receive rules not interpret them,
especially if they are supported by 'total
interpersonal relationships' (3). That close
connection would only prevent openly
'dissimulative behaviour', which is not the same
as the 'genuinely held attitude'. It is also
common even with the most rules defined activities
to also develop a distance towards other
expectations [more reference to his own work], and
even lower class people can learn techniques to
manage expectations as they learn about the
expectations.
It might be difficult to study empirically since
modes of expression of role distance vary. It
requires 'an intimate knowledge of the group',
usually gained by PO. It may be a rare phenomenon,
not worth studying on its own: he usually appears
in wider studies of occupations.
Between 1970 and 2001, the concept was much cited
[with a list page 3], and was even seen as a
necessary quality showing flexibility and
tolerance of ambiguity. Pornography patrons showed
a continuum of stances from role distance to role
identification. Studies of consumers have shown
they might do it, and so might funeral directors
especially when embalming bodies. Slow learners do
it as well, although again there was a suggestion
that being able to do role distance decreases with
ability. Other studies have been on bartenders or
social workers.
Some studies raised doubts — some seminary
students had to be both egalitarian with others in
the community but professionally distant from
punters, and sometimes 'jocular humour' which
could be denied was apparent. Role distance began
to appear in popular self-help literature. It can
help reduce stigma, for example in the funeral
industry again, and Auster and MacCrone (1994)
found that 'faculty members occasionally took role
distance when interacting with students and that
this was correlated with the gender of both
groups'. Similar findings were found in
multicultural settings, where role distance is
necessary while presenting one's own identity.
Other studies have seen role distance as a part of
'rituals of resistance' to employers. Again humour
is sometimes needed. Australian men use role
distance when discussing 'gender scripts'. Teacher
dress codes can also indicate either role
embracement or role distance.
There have also been several theoretical papers
[one of which compares Goffman and Schutz, while
another compares Durkheim on suicide and Goffman
on role distance. There is also a link with
structuration theory in Giddens] but generally the
concept is not central to social science.
The dramaturgical perspective is metaphoric and it
has led to useful knowledge of human interaction
and its 'expressive nature (5). Sometimes
this is overlooked however, and the metaphor
is not explored as fully as it might be. In social
sciences it can be used in open-ended and
exploratory investigations, to suggest some paths
to follow, to orient thought and research via
metaphor, in the form of 'sensitising concepts'.
Metaphor is important in grounded theory. This is
what role distance actually needs. The problem is
that there is no systematic linkage between the
studies [what Stebbins calls concatenation]. Some
dramaturgical concepts have not developed their
potential.
Role is the most celebrated derivative from
theatre, and Goffman extends the notion to talk
about front stage, backstage and prop. Role
distance is not technically found in theatre
terminology, but it goes together with impression
management and presentation of self. The concept
of role has been developed theoretically, for
example in terms of a set of '"normatively
expected behavioural enactments in social
situations, revealing reciprocity between actors"'
(6, quoting Wilkinson and Erickson), but
theoretical tidiness can limit exploratory
potential.
The dramaturgic metaphor also necessarily omits
some aspects. One is the activity, where people
think do something 'motivated by the hope of
achieving a desired end'. They can be both
pleasant and unpleasant, 'work, leisure, or
nonwork obligation'. Sometimes they refer to
behaviour, sometimes to role, and Goffman has
distinguished them — 'people riding a
merry-go-round and those riding a real horse'.
Activitiy is more abstract and broad than role,
which are associated with particular statuses. Not
all activities are. As a result, those that are
not have been relatively overlooked — including
sleeping or eating lunch. Roles are static but
activities dynamic [despite the usual definition
that sees roles as dynamic aspects of status].
Generally, roles have inactive expectations for
behaviour. We see the effect of motives better
with activity, and better study 'invention and
human agency' including role distance where people
'thumb their nose at established expectations of
them' (7).
We can further specify core activity, distinctive
actions that must be followed to achieve the
outcome. These are pursued in work and leisure,
seen best of all in serious leisure. Even in
casual leisure, core activities are required —
holding sociable conversations, savouring
beautiful scenery. Core activities can have their
own motivational value, for example when the
activity is itself agreeable.
They can be simple or complex. Thus casual leisure
has relatively simple core activities, but the
complexity increases if we are, for example,
playing organised games or serving as a casual
volunteer, even developing our own 'sensual
experience of touristic sites' [as 'middle-class
Canadian mass tourists' do]. The attractions of
complexity is basic to leisure, especially of the
serious kind — playing an instrument, volunteering
as a medical worker, even driving in city traffic
(8).
The definition of activity does not fit some
things — involuntary eg coerced behaviour. There
are middle cases where people are volunteers, but
feel 'compelled to participate', following the
law, for example. The key is that these are
pursuing the ends of others, involving a lack of
agency. It is impossible to take role distance in
these cases. In most social sciences, activity
means broad behaviour, but we should refine it,
ideally by looking at leisure studies and sport
studies.
Goffman suggests that people can distance from
activities as well as roles. So we can now see
that role distance involves 'dislike toward all
part of a set of role or activity requirements'
(8), especially those that threaten loss of
respects or support for one's self conception [but
there need to be 'reference others present in the
situation']. Activities can be institutionalised,
subject to obligation, but reveal better than
roles what is actually being done. They consist of
acts some of which might be role distance
behaviour. Role expectations are generally
'abstract directives' but activities are
'understood by the participants in terms of what
they must actually do to reach their goals'. Thus
riding a merry-go-round is an activity even if not
a role, but people can still distance themselves
[for example by not holding on too tight]
The focus on agreeable activities is 'the
cornerstone of a positive sociology', not just an
add-on but an important new sensitising concept.
It sensitises us to interaction. It helps people
'find positive things in life' which have to be
blended and balanced with the negative things.
Role distance can help increase positivity, and
neutralise 'self demeaning role and activity
requirements'. It not only handles threats to
self-esteem but can become more positive, 'a way
to make life worthwhile'. It helps us develop
ecstasy, standing outside the routines to give us
a new perspective which can be 'exhilarating'.
Intellectual interest in role distance seems to
have reached a plateau, lacking a research
programme centre or prominent individuals, which
might codify and extend into grounded theory. A
first step might be to link it to dramaturgical
sociology and thus symbolic interactionism,
especially if we see it as a route to positivity.
This will lead us to investigate leisure
activities and how they are articulated with work
and nonwork.
back to social theory
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