SOCIETY IN FOCUS:AN INTRODUCTION TO …

1 William Joseph V. HickeyAllyn & Bacon75 Arlington St., Suite 300 Boston, MA Copy ISBN(Please use above number to order your exam copy.) 2005sample chapterThe pages of this Sample Chapter may haveslight variations in final published contact your local Allyn & Bacon/Longman IN focus : AN INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY, 5/e119 Chapter 5 Social Interaction in Everyday LifeFred s hands perspire as he sitsat the keyboard and prepares totype a response to Nina s last corre-spondence. They have known eachother for almost three months, andwhat started as a very casual acquain-tance has blossomed into an importantand caring relationship based on commoninterests, shared humor, mutual understand-ing, and, most important, love.

2 Fred is ready topop the big question, but he is nervous in fact, he s downright if she says no? Or, more frightening, what if she says yes?As a confidence builder, Fred rereads the ad that brought the two ofthem together: Attractive, single African American female in early twen-ties, likes bicycling, body surfing, long walks along the beach on warmmoonlit nights seeking young attractive like-minded male for conver-sation, friendship, and whatever else may develop. I m a 5-foot 8-inch,115-pound aerobics instructor who has an open mind and will try almostanything once.

3 If you re interested, meet me poolside at the CybercityHotel (nonsmokers only, please). Ask for Naughty can Fred pose this important question? After all, he hasn t beentotally honest with her. He told her that he is vice president of account-ing at a major firm but he is only 1 of 40 assistant accountants whowork there. They celebrated when he passed the CPA exam a month will she do when she discovers he was actually so frightened thathe didn t even take the exam? Fred hates to admit it, but much of hisrelationship with Nina is based on takes a deep breath, summons all his courage, and types: Nina,I think it is time we meet in person.

4 What do you think? Love, s consternation is nothing compared to the humor it producesat the other end when it is received by Nina. Nina is neither AfricanAmerican nor an aerobics instructor. And although Nina is indeed 5 feet8 inches tall, heweighs a little over 175 pounds. While Fred may nothave taken the CPA exam, Nina, whose real name is Frank, earned hisOutlineSocial StructureStatusesRolesBox focus Prisoners and Guards in a Mock PrisonSocial NetworksBox focus Jobs and Social NetworksSocial InstitutionsSocial InteractionPatterns of Social InteractionSocial Perception and StereotypesSocial ActsPersonal Space and NonverbalCommunicationBox focus Interacting with Santa Clausat the MallDefining Social SituationsDramaturgy: Presentation of Self and Impression ManagementEthnomethodology.

5 The Taken-for-Granted Aspects of InteractionSocial Interaction, Mass Media, and the TechnomediaSociological Approaches toInteraction in Everyday LifeThe Structural Functionalist ApproachThe Conflict PerspectiveThe Symbolic Interactionist ApproachLooking to the Future: Social Interaction in theTwenty-First Century120 CPA on his thirty-fifth birthday. He and his wife and two daughters celebratedby going out to dinner that night. That was 32 years ago. Frank, now retired,gets bored, so while his wife watches television, he plays on the the last three months, he has surfed the Net dropping in and out of chatrooms under various pseudonyms, including: Wicked Walt, The Iceman, LovelyLucy, and one of his favorites, Naughty date, Nina has received over300 marriage proposals and more than 1,000 requests for personal meetings,and has provided dozens of hours of harmless entertainment for is no is no is no the WorldWide Web, there are only minds.

6 (popular television ad for the Internet)It s virtually impossible to determine precisely how manypeople in the United States and around the world haveaccess to personal computers and at some time or anothergo online to use the Internet; the number changes daily or,more accurately, by the minute. (See Map for per capitaInternet connections around the world.) We do know, how-ever, that computers and the World Wide Web have dramat-ically altered our understanding of the world and how weinteract with one another in our everyday lives.

7 Think aboutthe fictitious vignette involving Fred and Nina. Would suchdeception have been possible before the use of personal com-puters? Is the hoax perpetuated by Nina harmless fun?What are the possible consequences of such a hoax? Wouldyou even categorize the correspondence between Fred and Nina as social interaction?Sociologists know that age, race, ethnicity, sex, gender, andsocial class are but a few of the important variables that sig-nificantly affect how people interact in our everyday lives. Dothese variables come into play when people interact over theInternet?

8 If so, in what ways? Or, as one television advertise-ment for the Internet declares, is cyberspace a place whereinteraction can take place where these social characteristicsdo not matter? These and other questions immediately spring to mind when thevignette is viewed from a sociological perspective. The vignette also illustrates the guid-ing theme of this book:things are not necessarily what they may be especiallytrue when it comes to social interaction in everyday StructureDespite the extraordinary complexity of social life in all contemporary societies,social relations are not random.

9 If you look carefully, you will see that your lifeand virtually everyone s life has certain patterns of social interaction that are repeatedover and over again. Sociologists calls this social structure the ordered relationshipsand patterned expectations that guide social interaction and it is fundamental to life inall would happen if these nearly invisible patterns of interaction were suddenlysuspended? The authors discovered the answer when, during a visit to a large publish-ing company, a tornado alarm sounded. Until the alarm, our interactions with editors,salespersons, and business managers were fairly routine.

10 Bureaucracies, of which thepublishing company is one, give the appearance of rigid order, and this allows peopleto respond to others in predictable ways. We had fairly clear ideas of how we ought toChapter 5:Social Interaction in Everyday LifeSOCIAL STRUCTUREThe ordered relationships andpatterned expectations thatguide social and the Internethave dramatically affected socialinteraction. Today, people cancommunicate instantaneouslywith others in the next room,across the street, across thenation, and across the impact has the Internethad on some of the mostimportant sociologicalvariables in interaction such as age, race, sex, and social class?