Erving Goffman

Lore & Background

Goffman was born in Mannville, Alberta, to Ukrainian Jewish emigrants. He studied chemistry at the University of Manitoba, then worked for the National Film Board of Canada before earning a BA in sociology and anthropology at the University of Toronto. He received his MA and PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago, completing his doctoral dissertation based on ethnographic fieldwork on the island of Unst in the Shetland Islands. His first major work, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1956), grew from that research.

Goffman held faculty positions at the University of California, Berkeley, and later the University of Pennsylvania, where he became the Benjamin Franklin Chair in Sociology and Anthropology. He served as the 73rd president of the American Sociological Association (1981–1982). His other major works include Asylums (1961), Stigma (1963), Interaction Ritual (1967), Frame Analysis (1974), and Forms of Talk (1981). He was a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and received a Guggenheim Fellowship for 1977–1978.

Goffman married Angelica Schuyler Choate in 1952; they had a son, Thomas. After her death by suicide in 1964, he married sociolinguist Gillian Sankoff in 1981; their daughter Alice was born in 1982. Goffman died of stomach cancer in Philadelphia on 19 November 1982.

Reader's Guide

Goffman's significance lies in his development of a comparative, qualitative sociology that aimed to produce generalizations about human behavior, particularly through the study of face-to-face interaction. He elaborated the 'dramaturgical approach' to human interaction, viewing social life as a performance where individuals manage impressions. His concept of 'interaction order' focused on the organization of everyday behavior. Goffman contributed to the sociological concept of framing, to game theory via strategic interaction, and to the study of interactions and linguistics, arguing that speaking is a social rather than linguistic construct. Methodologically, he employed ethnography, most famously in studying total institutions. His work bridged agency and structure, popularizing social constructionism, symbolic interaction, conversation analysis, and ethnographic studies. His influence extended beyond sociology into communication research. Goffman introduced the concept of nonperson treatment and defined 'impression management' as attempts to present an acceptable image. He broke from George Herbert Mead and Herbert Blumer by emphasizing the physical proximity or interaction order that molds the self.

Did You Know?

• In 2007, The Times Higher Education Guide listed Goffman as the sixth most-cited author of books in the humanities and social sciences.
• Goffman was unable to deliver his presidential address to the American Sociological Association due to progressing illness.