symbolic interactionism

Symbolic interactionism is a theoretical perspective that people use definitions, meanings, symbols, interpretations, and human interactions to compare themselves to others (Henslin, 2010, p. 15). Herbert Blumer, whom attended University of Chicago with one of the founders of the

In The Blind Side, Michael was raised in the projects of Memphis, Tennessee. One evening after a basketball game Leigh Anne Touhy notices Michael walking down the road, shivering in the cold. After having her husband stop the car to speak to him, she had learned Michael had planned to sleep at the school gym after everyone else had left. Leigh Anne offered Michael a warm place to sleep at her and her family’s home. This moment between these two was Michael’s first real feeling of family. This sparked the relationship that would give him a reason to keep living and gave him something to live for. Leigh Anne continued to include Michael in family gatherings which only enhanced the motherly feeling Michael got from her.

Symbolic interactionism focuses on the language and symbols that help us give meaning to the experiences in life. It also studies how people discuss the meaning of social life during interactions

Symbolic interactionism is a theory is defined as, ”a theoretical perspective in which society is viewed as composed of symbols that people use to establish meaning,

Explain the three major sociological perspectives of functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism. Identify which perspectives use a macro level or a micro level of analysis. Apply each perspective to socialization.

Symbolic interactionism helps explain both of our individual personalities and the ways the human society is linked together (p.27). It also helps us differentiate social order and change through a process. The teachings of symbolic interactionism comes mostly from George Herbert Mead But,George was not the only one that influenced the thoughts and ideas of symbolic interactionism. Symbolic interaction is theoretical perspective so it is still changing and evolving. It also has four kinds of understandings in the population and environment. One of the understandings is that symbolic interactionism is to understand why people engage or do not engage in social growth of the population . Symbolic Interactionism assumes that people from different social backgrounds, and different cultures may see different social issues within their social community. George Mead,Charles Cooley and Herbert Blumer shaped symbolic interactionism on the predictions of yourself causing you to behave a certain way so it becomes true.

Herbert Blumer, the first person to use the term symbolic interactionism, once suggested three basic premises for it. He put the first one as “humans act toward a thing on the basis of the meaning they assign to the thing” , which is to say that human’s perceptions and behaviors are not directly determined by objects or phenomena in the physical

People associate actions with a meaning. As one grows up actions seem to obtain a connotation, weather it be positive or negative. The symbols or meaning people attach to the actions are influenced by one’s socialization. Edward Alsworth Ross, a progressive American sociologist, eugenicist, and major figure of early criminology, suggested socialization is the development of one’s feelings and the will to act based on an influence by a variety of different circumstances and conditions (652). The connotation of an action can differ based on the experiences and circumstances one has lived through. The act of identifying that action with the interpretation is an example of symbolic interactionism. Monica A. Longmore, a professor of sociology at Bowling Green State University, explains symbolic interactionism is the relationship between a behavior and how it is identified (44). Behaviors are comprehended by how it is symbolized in one’s socialization. The thesis of this essay is some basic social behaviors taught in one’s culture are best understood using symbolic interactionism to interpret what is meant on a conscious and subconscious level.

Symbolic Interactionism looks at how every individual will give everything in their society a different meaning depending on their past experiences and expectations. It is a behavior dictated by the meanings we connect to signs, symbols, and interactions. The main thought was that your sense of self develops through social interactions that you have with other people. And those interactions are based on the symbols that you view during that time. Symbolic Interactionism examines deviance by not trusting official statistics and see them as socially constructed, ignores big structures such as class and poverty, and does not concerned with why people commit crime, more concerned with how certain groups become labeled as criminals.

Everyday thousands of senior citizens and people with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia suffer from abuse by a caregiver. Most of the abuse is in the form of emotional or physical abuse, but there are also a number of different types of abuse including financial abuse. The abuse can either take place in a medical setting such as a nursing home or hospital, or it can also be done by the victim’s own family members. These senior citizens are mostly targeted due to the fact that they are mentally incapacitated; they do not have a very strong short term memory, and sometimes they do not have the ability to talk to another individual about how their caregiver has been abusing them.

Symbolic interactionist is a micro level of social analysis, it is concerned with individual experiences and the wider society. As well as not focusing on the core structures or support the general theory of society like the functionalist does.

George Herbert Mead studied and used an interactionist approach for many years. He was a philosophy professor at the university of Chicago. Mead thought that the true test to any theory is whether or not it is useful in solving complex social problems (EM Griffin, p.83). So Mead decided to study the procedures of communicating, specifically with symbols, the theory was titled Symbolic Interactionism.

Symbolic interactionism as a term was coined by Herbert Blumer to further develop the theories of George Herbert Mead and Charles Horton Cooley. This perspective gives priority to the importance of understanding the meanings of social action. This framework works with the belief that human social behaviour is based on symbolic meanings that are found within a given situation (Tepperman et al., 2013 p.369). Symbolic interactionism, being a form of microsociology, focuses attention on the smallest systems of society, being individual people and their interaction. Symbolic interactionists, like all microsociologists, see society

The symbolic interactionism theory is the view of social behavior of individual that emphasizes linguistic and the gestural communication in a society and its subjective understanding of different matters, but especially the role of language in the formation of the child as a social being and social behavior in the society.

Symbolic interaction offers a dramaturgical perspective of how people identify and create their social self through social interaction. Many social theorist studies social interaction/ self as a function to our society. In addition, microsociology develop the idea of applying social interaction on a smaller sample size within the society. Therefore, there were an increase in the study of human interaction and the self. Mead develop his idea through symbolic interaction and social psychology of the human mind. Simmel develop his idea through the perspective of symbolic interaction of urban sociology. Both sociologist focus on the inter social aspect of the human life.