Ryan: Sociology of Everyday Life 2012

Mad Libs. Read pp. 3-6 of Goffman'sPresentation of Self in Everyday Life focusing especially on the character Preedy. Write a short biographical essay (it can be fictionalized) that tracks the narrative of the Preedy passage but in a situation in your own life.

“Of the two kinds of communication - expressions given and expressions given off - this report will be primarily concerned with the latter, with the more theatrical and contextual kind, the non-verbal, presumably unintentional kind, whether this communication be purposely engineered or not. As an example of what we must try to examine, I would like to cite at length a novelistic incident in which Preedy, a visiting American, makes his first appearance in a naked co-ed saunaduring his summer visit to Germany.[1]

“But in any case he took care to avoid catching anyone's eye. First of all, he had to make it clear to those potential companions in thesauna that their bodies were of no concern to him whatsoever. He stared through them, round them, over them-eyes lost in space. The facility might have been empty. If by chance a naked child ran his way, he looked surprised; then let a smile of amusement lighten his face (Kindly Preedy), welcoming the chance to have something to do other than looking for an empty chaise lounge to sit in. He looked round alarmed at the crowd of people who could probably tell he was looking in vain for a free spot, but tossed it back with a smile to himself and not a smile at the people, and then resumed carelessly his nonchalant survey of spacetrying to adopt a look that said "maybe I find a spot, maybe I don't – all the same to me.

“But it was time to institute a little parade, the parade of the actually-I'm-GermanPreedy. By devious handlings he gave any who wanted to look a chance to see the title of his book, a contemporary Germannovel, trendy thus, but not daring, cosmopolitan too - and then arranged his towel in a neat and orderly way on a free chair – exactly like the others around him but being sure not to look like he was imitating them (I-know-the-normsPreedy), and then he rose slowly to stretch and remove his robesucking in his abs and straightening his back (fit middle-aged guyPreedy), and nonchalantly removed his flipflops, walked naked over to the edge of the pool as if he did it everyday, and dove in. (Carefree Preedy, after all).

“The marriage of Preedy and the wellness! There were alternative rituals. The first involved a session in the sauna that was followed bya casual walk over to the cold water dunking tank and a jump straight into the bone chilling water, thereafter moving slowly to suggestno hurry at all to get out. But of course he does not stay long. Quite suddenly he would pull himself up the latter and shaking the water off his limbs casually, somehow thus showing that he could have stayed in longer had he wanted to, and then would stand up tall at the edge of the tank for all to see who It was.

“The alternative course was simpler, it avoided the cold-water shock and it avoided the risk of appearing too much the overcompensating middle-aged man. The point was to appear to be so used to the sauna phenomenon, the steam baths and jacuzzis, and this particular facility, that one might as well be in the any of the facilities as out on the pool deck or in the quiet room. It involved a slow stroll up to each facility- not even noticing whether the naked bodies were male or female, attractive or not, or even whether the facility was crowded or empty– all the same to him –as he focused his eyes up onthermometers gravely assessing the appropriateness of the temperature, a detail to which others were oblivious, of the steam, water, or air. (Sauna Aficionado Preedy).

[1]William Sansom,A Contest of Ladies(London: Hogarth, 1956), PP. 230-3-2.