Compare and Contrast the Way Each Author Approaches and Understands Identity

Hall vs. Goffman

Goffman (1959) defines identity in a metaphoric manner as a type of theatrical performance that is shaped by the motives of the actor and the audience. Thus, person's identity is dependent on the social and relational aspects of the situation. There is degree as to how much someone actually believes that the performance one is giving represents reality. At one extreme, a person/performer believes whatever they are doing represents reality and at the other extreme the performer has no belief at all that their actions stand for anything sincere or real. Goffman's analogy is an attempt to relay the notion that identity is social in nature and a social construction.

A central concept in Goffman's analogy is the concept of front, the standardized expressive equipment that people use to define situations in a fixed way. There are several components of a front: The setting represents the environmental parts of expressive equipment. The personal front is other items of expressive equipment such as looks, race, sex, speech patterns, etc. The appearance consists of those aspects that relay social status. Manner relates to those aspects of communication that that tell of others the type roles the performer expects to play in a situation. The appearance is a relatively changeless condition that signifies who we are; the manner is how we want to be perceived during a specific situation.

Actions in the presence of others are undertaken not for their intrinsic sake, but with the reactions of others in mind. The actor typically dramatizes their actions highlighting and emphasizing whatever messages/impressions they most want to convey to their audience. With respect to the actual acting, people such as physicians or police have no problem with this dramatization, whereas those in other professions may face more difficulty. When this happens there can be a crisis concerning whether one should focus on doing what they are doing for their own sake or should be more concerned expressing their actions to the audience.

When we perform we tend to offer observers idealized impressions. One aspect of this idealization is that we may conceal aspects of our lives that we do not want observers to see. Or performers may exaggerate the relationships they have with others as being special. Identity is sensed as feelings of the participants that they are of special significance to one another. One form of impression management is mystification, a technique employed to keep the observers in awe of oneself. This requires the maintenance of social distance and regulating contact with others.

Goffman argues against the historical tendency to distinguish between two types of actions: (1) the real performance, uncontrived and occurring as the unconscious response to the environmental conditions surrounding the actor; and (2) the false performance, which is not a response to the specific conditions around the actor. There is no intrinsic relationship between appearance and reality. An actor can manage their own impressions of reality by acting in a dishonest fashion. All reality is socially constructed.

Hall (1996) does not fully side with the notion that all reality is socially constructed. Identity can form out of a reaction or rebellion to social constructions that limit the individual or group to being stigmatized. Hall places a little more emphasis on the individual's choices and the ability of the individual to act voluntarily in response to his surroundings, but he still invokes quite a bit of structuralism. Identity is shaped in part by historical events, the environment, others impressions, and a person's perceptions; however, based on changes in how blacks were able to adapt and change their selfhood and their impressions on others, he views identity as less a social construction and more of individual (or group) agent forging their identity based on their needs and goals and solely on the interactions they have with others. From Goffman's viewpoint blacks would not act in a certain manner dependent on their audience. For instance, performing for a white audience a black may act in a more subservient manner, even though the person did not view themselves as such, whereas with one's peers the same person might act in a more extroverted and assertive manner, again, even though one may or may not view these actions as being real. For Hall this would create a state of confusion such that a search for the real identity outside of performances would occur. Hall views the message (performance) as being effective in its ability to establish a meaningful dialogue with the audience and its ability to be decoded. The message is not produced simply to allow a role ply, but to make a statement about the true nature of the sender. Thus, there need be some form of genuine and truthful attempt to display reality. One gets a sense that according to Hall the message (or performance in Goffman's terms) has more meat in it. The performance is not something fixed or determined by the person sending the message and the audience it is meant for, but instead an exchange between the person and those whom the person is trying to communicate. The "audience" is not a passive receptor of the "performance." It is here where Hall emphasizes language and culture as important influences on identity. Hall appears to place more emphasis on how the person encodes and decodes descriptions of oneself, one's intentions, and one's goals. Because the experiences of blacks were socially constructed by whites and blacks in the past, Hall views identity as a forging of oneself with different contexts such as historical, cultural, and personal. Hall purports more of a view of identity in as the interplay of multiple variables. Because of this Hall places more emphasis on language and the how people decode messages sent by others. The goal of the sender is to send a message that reflects reality, but can be decoded by the receiver. Identity can be a social construction, but is also defined in opposition to historical social constructions based on messages that were decoded improperly or miscommunications from the sender. Such distortions appear to be a part of the process. By continually retelling the story a culturally specific interpretation becomes reality (e.g., the identity of blacks).