Herbert Blumer (1900-1987) was a student and later a professor at the University of Chicago who continued and developed the ideas of Mead. Blumer coined the term symbolic interactionism in 1937, keeping this sociological perspective alive through the early 1950s at Chicago, and then in California where he was a professor at the University of Californa in Berkeley. His ideas were important in the development of sociology in North America, countering the dominant approach of Parsons and playing a major part in developing the symbolic interaction perspective as a major school of sociological thought. Blumer views symbolic interaction in the following manner.

According to Blumer, the characteristics of this approach are (i) human interaction, (ii) interpretation or definition rather than mere reaction, (iii) response based on meaning, (iv) use of symbols, and (v) interpretation between stimulus and response. Blumer proposed an interpretive model for sociology which "inserts a middle term into the stimulus response couplet so that it becomes stimulus-interpretation-response" (Wallace and Wolf, p. 206).

Blumer builds on the approach of Mead and notes how social context works for Mead:

Blumer argues that sociologists have generally taken a different approach from that of Mead, rarely recognizing society "as composed of individuals who have selves. Instead, they assume human beings to be merely organisms with some kind of organization, responding to forces which play upon them." (p. 185). Sociologists use concepts such as values, norms, roles, classes, and structures and consider these to describe or determine how individuals act. That is, these forces are considered to be independent social phenomena which act on or through individuals, leaving little or no room for the self, interpretation, or meaning. Examples of this approach are when sociologists describe how one variable affects another or individual action is considered to be explained by variables such as social class, religion, or education. The statistical approach certainly expresses this if not used carefully. For example, attitudes or voting behaviour may be "explained" by referring to income, occupation, socioeconomic status, region, education, or age – for example, saying that working class people are class conscious are hence will vote for the NDP. For Blumer, these approaches treat the social action of people "as an outward flow or expression of forces playing on them rather than as acts which are built up by people through their interpretation of the situations in which they are placed" (Blumer, p. 185).

Blumer suggests that sociologists using a symbolic interaction perspective adopt a number of assumptions and methods that are as follows (see Blumer, pp. 186-7).

a. Acting people should be considered to be the basic units of human society. These are like Mead's act, with the acting units being individual people, groups, or organizations. Blumer's view of human society is that it consists of acting units and acting people, and all activity in society springs from such acting units. These acting units are to be viewed in the way that Mead did, as taking on the role of others, using interpretation, and considering meaning in action. Blumer describes society as follows.

b. Situations. The situations or settings in which action takes place must always be considered. If a family is being examined, the manner in which the family members act will depend on the setting. This might be considered similar to the multiple roles that Parsons imagined individuals as filling. For Blumer though, these roles are not nearly as fixed or determined as in the structural functional approach, and involve interpretation, that is, "the action is formed or constructed by interpreting the situation. … Group life consists of acting units developing acts to meet the situations in which they are placed" (p. 187).

c. Interpretation. The acting unit interprets each situation, and the action is then constructed or carried out in the light of that interpretation. This contrasts with predictable effects based on the influence or stimulus of various factors on the individual. The individual takes into account the "tasks, opportunities, obstacles, means, demands, discomforts, dangers, and the like" (p. 187) and uses these to guide his or her own action.

d. Structures are the common understanding among many actors of appropriate forms of activity in particular situations, based on past experience. That is, acting units tend to adopt patterns or take on repetitive forms of behaviour. While these form the institutions and structures that the structuralist approach examines, these structures are much more flexible and less rigidly interconnected than in the structural approach. Blumer notes that "through previous interaction they develop and acquire common understandings or definitions of how to act in this or that situation. These common definitions enable people to act alike" (p. 187).

e. Study of the process of interpretation must not fall back on either the antecedent conditions or the results as a means of explanation. Rather, a sociologist must catch the process of interpretation, and put oneself in the position of the individual or group being examined. While structures as repetitive patterns of behaviour do exist, each part of those is a process of interpretation by the actors. Typical responses in earlier, similar situations provide a guide to understanding the interpretation of the actor, but cannot be taken as a substitute for developing the understanding of the meaning for the acting unit in each situation. In order to do this, "the student must take on the role of the acting unit whose behavior he is studying" (Blumer, p. 187). Similarly, the result of the action cannot be regarded as an explanation for the action, even if it forms part of a pattern of behavior.

f. Results. Blumer argues that if the sociologist adopts this approach and method, there are two differences from the conventional sociological approach. (i) What sociologists mean by "society" is the place where social action occurs, rather than society being regarded as the determinant of such action. (ii) Organization of, and changes in, society are the result of the activity of acting units and not of "forces" that do not consider the acting units. This approach is useful in considering social change, something that conventional strufctural approaches might find difficulty in explaining. Two examples of statements that Blumer gives are claims made by other sociologists:

Economic depression increases solidarity in families of workers.

Industrialization replaces extended with nuclear families.

These may both be correct statements as historical conclusions, but as stated they (i) ignore the role of interpretive behaviour, or (ii) regard the behaviour as coerced or determined by the factor of change. (paragraph based on Blumer, pp. 191).

Adams and Sydie (p. 504) summarize Blumer’s approach with three premises or assumptions. These are as follows.

a. Human beings act toward things on the basis of the meanings that things have for them. Human consciousness, the ability of humans to indicate something to themselves about their surroundings leads to the possibility of meaning. Individuals in any situation are surrounded by myriad characteristics of their environment, but certain of these are meaningful. Blumer terms this indicating something by taking things from the setting – indications such as a knock at a door or the appearance of a friend (Wallace and Wolf, p. 209). The things extricated from the setting may be gestures, sounds, material things, or what symbolic interactionists call symbols. The individual takes note of these, has an understanding of them, notes them to himself or herself, and makes decisions concerning how to proceed. That is, the individual interprets these things as meaningful symbols and uses the symbols in action.

b. The meaning of things arises out of the social interaction one has with one’s fellows. Things do not have inherent meaning in and of themselves, but the meaning is socially created, through experience with these as one interacts with other individuals and groups in society. For example, if one does not know a particular language, the sounds uttered by others speaking that language have no meaning for the individual, they are merely sounds. Gestures and practices from other cultures, such as religious or patriotic symbols and rituals, have no meaning for those not familiar with them. But practices, symbols, and gestures of the type frequently experienced generally have meaning for the individual.

Two points should be noted about these. First, it may be difficult for an individual who is part of the social world in which the symbols are developed and used to comprehend them. While a sociologist may need to put himself or herself in the position of the individual using the symbol to understand it, it may also be necessary for the sociologist to adopt a certain distance or method by which the symbol can be identified and examined. Second, while the meaning of the symbol is likely to be developed on the basis of common understandings, there may not be agreement concerning the purpose or appropriateness of the symbol. For example, I may have an understanding of the meaning of the national anthem in the United States, but I may not wish to stand, take off my cap, or place my right hand across my heart. That is, commonly understood meanings imply that the individual must have had enough interaction with others to understand the thing, but it that does not mean that the individual accepts or adopts the symbol or its commonly understood purpose.

c. The meanings of things are handled in and modified through an interpretive process used by the person in dealing with things he encounters. This can be contrasted with a more structural sociological approach. The latter may identify the same symbols as having meaning, but the symbolic interaction perspective considers meaning to be much more flexible. That is, through interaction with others, the individual understands the common meaning associated with the symbols, but may modify and changes this, in a flexible way. The same symbol may have different meanings in different settings, for different individuals, and depending on how the individual interprets the setting. For example, a familiar gesture from a friend may take on a different meaning if one feels somewhat estranged from the friend than if there have been smoother relations. Particular words and phrases may be appropriate in one circumstance and not in another – e.g. calling people by their first name.

Blumer noted how the meanings are a result of a dialogue with oneself. That is, when responding in a particular way to a symbol, the individual notes the symbol and, however quickly or unconsciously, develops a particular response. This stage of interpretation between stimulus and response involves some dialogue with oneself, considering what was meant by the symbol, what one wants to portray in a response, how the other person will understand and interpret the response, and what is the most appropriate response in the circumstance. All this is done in a dialogue with oneself.

Blumer notes that structures do exist as "social roles, status positions, rank orders, bureaucratic organizations" (Wallace and Wolf, p. 212) but that these do not determine behavior. Rather, interaction is between people, not between roles or statuses, so that people form the direction and content of these interactions. For Blumer, the person in a role has considerable flexibility and can improvise within a setting. Interaction theory is thus concerned with plausible lines of action characteristic of particular personalities. It is this flexibility and forms of interaction, rather than the structural aspects of the settings, that interest sociologists who use the symbolic interaction perspective.

The most important aspect of this perspective is that the subject is object to itself (Wallace and Wolf, p. 214). As humans, we can act toward ourselves (or at least imagine this) when confronting others. Action is pieced together as an individual takes the setting into account. Even in common settings, such as a family, a classroom, or cafeteria, conduct must be devised as well. But in contrast to Parsons, the process of interpretation is less structured and more inventive. That is, an individual does not tote up all the positives and negatives for each of the five pattern variables, and on this basis consciously decide on a course of action. Rather, the individual more likely has developed a means for dealing with situations and uses this to interpret a new situation.

Situations that may require more consideration are those where sentiments are an important aspect, and adversary situations. Each of these require considerable interpretation on the part of individuals, and it is here that flexibility and innovation are likely to be useful. It is in groups settings, with commonly understood, orderly, fixed, and repetitious where lines of behaviour by different individuals have been fitted together. A situation such as a family dinner illustrate this. At the same time, Blumer notes that these group actions (i) must be initiated, (ii) are interpreted, transformed, or abandoned, (iii) can be associated with lack of a common definition, and (iv) may lead to a new situation or setting. Thus there is some element of uncertainty even in group actions that have occurred in many similar settings. Coordination and action must be worked out and achieved through interaction of the individuals, it is not just a result of underlying structural factors.

See Adams and Sydie, p. 504. Inductive approach. Ordinary and familiar settings. Naturalistics and exploratory. Qualitative.

Meaning and interpretation are better defined than Weber or Parsons, and Blumer fills out the explanation of meaning more completely than did Mead.

Begins with actors and situations, much like Parsons, but the theoretical direction taken is very different than Parsons and structural theories.

Importance of symbols, gestures, etc. and their connection to meaning.

One of the sociologists who used a type of symbolic interaction approach to examine human interaction in social settings was Goffman. Goffman did not develop a theoretical approach that would explain all parts of the social world, but primarily analyzed the interaction order – the social situations or "environments in which two or more individuals are physically in one another’s presence" (Goffman in Lemert, p. 235). These are the situations where we spend much or most of our life – in face-to-face activities involving others, whether these be everyday social situations, situations within organized structures (jobs, school), or unusual social situations (accidents, weddings, funerals). Adams and Sydie note "Goffman’s work was the observation and analysis of individual conduct ‘as an attribute of social order, of society, not an attribute of individual persons" (p. 506). In doing this, he was concerned with the individual and the self, viewiing these as the "product of social interaction" (Adams and Sydie, p. 507). Goffman excels at observation and description, analyzing how people interpret and act in ordinary situations, and he provides guidelines concerning how to examine social situations.

An example of how Goffman approaches social interaction comes from the following quote.

This quote demonstrates Goffman’s approach – emphasis on the social nature of human beings, the social origin of the self, influences from society, forms of interaction, evaluation of self and others, practices and procedures for such interaction (both following and modifying rules), and maintaining some type of normal or equilibrium relationship in interaction. He notes that the system has "ritual principles" and "ritual equilibrium." Adams and Sydie argue that, for Goffman, the connection between individual and society is that of ritual (p. 507). That is, in order to maintain civility and good will in interaction, individuals perform rituals and the exercise and performance of these rituals is the "ritually organized system of social activity."

Erving Goffman (1922-1982) was born and raised in Alberta, and attended the University of Toronto and the University of Chicago. He became a professor at Berkeley and later at Pennsylvania. Goffman's best known work is The Presentation of the Self in Everyday Life (1959), the research for which he conducted in the Shetland Islands of Scotland (Adams and Sydie, p. 506). Goffman described and analyzed unusual situations such as monasteries, prisons, and asylums, total institutions that are "closed to the outside world" (Adams and Sydie, p. 513) and all-encompassing on social life within them. He used these examples to show how individuals developed and used various means (many unauthorized) to maintain their sense of selfhood within the constraints and regulations of these institutions. He also used these settings to illustrate aspects of everyday life, and the unexamined asumptions that we all make in such situations.

Goffman's approach is sometimes called dramaturgy or dramaturgical theory in that he used theatre and drama as a metaphor for how the individual presents his or her self and how individuals attempt to preserve selfhood. He examines the roles taken on by the individual, what the different aspects of these roles are, how the individual interprets these roles, and how the individual distances himself or herself from the role. These set the stage for explaining human interaction and it is the human linkages and countless minor syntheses that constitute the interaction order. Adams and Sydie note "The theatre metaphor was a handy means of illustrating the ‘structure of social encounters’ that occur in all social life" (p. 508).

Goffman examined the front and back stages or regions of human action and interaction in a theatrical settting, using these as a way of illusrating how everyday social life can be considered as a theatrical setting. Goffman defines the front region of daily life as that of managing the individual’s impressions in dealings with others. That is, a large part of what individuals do in face-to-face encounters is impression management – ensuring that the image given to others in an encounter is consistent with the role or impression that the individual wishes to convey. There are various props that might be considered natural, such as sex or age, size and looks (Adams and Sydie, p. 512) along with ways that the individual presents himself or herself – clothing, posture, bodily gestures, speech patterns – and what might be termed attitudes or forms of behaviour such as deference, submission, mastery, or emotion.

The back stage or region is what goes on behind the scene, as the individual prepares and practices impression management. If the individual is aware of the situation, the impressions are likely to be well developed and portrayed to others, with the individual having made appropriate choices in impression management, using acceptable forms of presentation appropriate for the situation. This might be compared to Mead’s views of the ability of humans to examine their actions and consider how others might view these actions. Goffman did not emphasize the dialogue with the self, preferring instead to concentrate on the ways in which people interact and manage these interactions (Wallace and Wolf, p. 240).

Two aspects of the relation between front and back need emphasis. First, "maintaining the separation of front and back is important for impression management" (Adams and Sydie, p. 512). This allows the individual to prepare for presentation, avoid embarrassment, and modify presentation between encounters. For Goffman, both individuals in a presentation or encounter on the front stage "have a stake in ensuring a successful performance" (Adams and Sydie, p. 512) and when it is not so successful, excuses may be provided and the other party may find ways to minimize the lack of success. That is, actors in the performance work together to create the possibility of ongoing forms of encounters that maintain the face of all involved. Sometimes this breaks down, when situations are difficult or when actors are not prepared. In such cases, interaction may stop or actors rehearse and prepare for a better performance next time.

A second element is that for an individual actor, it is important to ensure consistency of front and back regions. If there is consistency, the individual presents a self that is really the self – being yourself. In the case of inconsistency, some of these may become apparent if the individual is unable to manage impressions well. The situation of stage-managed presentations by politicians to media is a case in point. Politicians attempt to present positive impressions as part of the front region, but where the back region is inconsistent with this, a slip of the tongue, or unsolicited information may reveal an inconsistency.

Goffman shows the ways in which the individual works to manage impressions and accomplish a successful presentation of the self to others. Much of this work is hidden, and one of the tasks of the sociologist is to observe social situations in order to make more visible some of the unexamined aspects of encounters. For Goffman, all the ordinary situations in which interacting individuals find themselves involve a lot of work on the part of the individual.

Another example of Goffman’s approach is his examination of roles and role distance. Goffman notes that

One situation that Goffman examines in connection with roles is a merry-go-round. (See Encounters, pp. 97-100 for Goffman's analysis and Wallace and Wolf, p. 213 for a short description). A merry-go-round is a situation with a number of roles. The merry-go-round is a "natural and objective social unit." It is a "situated activity system ... yet persons are placed on this floor and something organic emerges. There is a mutual orientation of the participants ... a meshing together of their activity" (p. 97). Role differentiation emerges - those who ride, those who watch, those who take tickets and operate the merry-go-round, and each of these roles implies a certain image of the self. "For the merry-go-round rider, for example, the self awaiting is one that entails a child's portion of bravery and muscular control, a child's portion of manliness, and often a child's title."

Goffman examines role distance by considering people of different ages in their roles as merry-go-round riders. A two year old might find the prospect frightening and fight to stay off the merry-go-round horse – they may become frantic and have to be taken off. At ages three and four, there is still a challenge and the rider "throws himself into the role in a serious way ... passing his parents on each turn, the rider carefully lets go one of his hands and grimly waves a smile or a kiss" (p. 106). At age five, especially for boys, merely riding is not enough – parents are not likely to be allowed by the child to accompany them, one might keep time to the music by tapping his foot, another may lean back almost too far, etc. In this case the routine is accompanied by a self-image "an image from which he apparently withdraws by actively manipulating the situation" (p. 107). By age seven or eight, the child may ride with no hands and test limits. He may "try to show distance by handling the task with bored, nonchalant competence, a candy bar languidly held in one hand" (p. 108). At age eleven or twelve, the horse may became a race horse for the rider and the rider "is just old enough to achieve role distance by defining the whole undertaking as a lark, a situation for mockery" (p. 109). Adults have different methods of showing role distance – one may make a joke of fastening the safety belt, a dating couple ride adjacent horses hold hands to bring sentiment, not daring, to the situation, and so on.

Goffman defines role distance as "this ‘effectively’ expressed pointed separateness between the individual and his putative (commonly accepted) role" (p. 108). That is, "the individual is actually denying not the role but the virtual self (essence of self) that is implied in the role for all accepting performers" (p. 108). Goffman notes that while mastering riding the merry-go-round horse can be accomplished very easily and at a young age, "the task of expressing that it [the developmental task] is not [a challenge] continues for a long time to be a challenge and remains a full necessity." As well, "the immediate audiences figure very directly in the display of role distance" (p. 109). Goffman further notes two ways of establishing role distance: (i) isolating oneself as much as possible for the situation, or (ii) projecting a childish self.

At the end of this essay, Goffman notes that

Goffman’s earlier writings contain some analysis of sex and gender characteristics and relationships; in his later work, he expanded and developed his analysis of these relationships and their performance in society, providing interesting and insightful analyses. This is apparent in Gender Advertisements (1979) where Goffman presents photographs from advertisements that provide images of males, females, children, and relationships in social situations. These images are

While the advertisements portray ideal, artful, and "carefully performed poses," these are reflections of the way individuals perform in social situations. He concludes

For Goffman, each individual’s daily presentation in social interaction can be considered to be commercials, so that images in commercials are merely exaggerated expressions of daily performance. From this it could be argued that commercials are successful when they do this – portraying understandable and acceptable images of various aspects of life. As individuals, we recognize these images and, while television or magazine commercials are exaggerations, it is the daily acting out of similar forms of behaviour that advertisers build on.

Goffman argues that "there is a loose gearing … between social structures and what goes on in particular occasions of ritual experience" (Goffman in Lemert, 1997, p. 213). Portrayal in these situations are often related to status, role, or social distance, and a means of visible, physical positioning may be used to indicate these. Height, centrality in the image, and placement above or beside another, may all be used to indicate relative social position. This is demonstrated by the bowing or holding head high in the picture in "the ritualization of subordination" and also in the images of family. In the latter, the father is a little outside the circle of the rest of the family – perhaps demonstrating a real social distance and an ability to protect the family. When viewing such images, we may not consider them abnormal, because these images of the father match common understandings of the the role of father’s – at least at the time when Goffman obtained these images.

Goffman considers the natural sex differences to be significant "only because the culture makes them so" (Adams and Sydie, p. 515). There are natural and biological differences between males and females but it is social definition and social codes "which also establishes the conceptions individuals have concerning their fundamental human nature" (Goffman in Lemert, 1997, p. 201). As an example, Goffman argues

When considering social situations and gender performance, Goffman argues that it is not fruitful to search for natural expressions, since it is not clear what these might be. As individuals relate to each other, what is expressed "is the capacity and inclination of individuals to portrary a version of themselves and their relationships as strategic moments" (Goffman in Lemert, 1997, p. 222). For Goffman,

The portrayals of femininity in Gender Advertisements then include smiles, puckish styling, "bashful knee bend," and "head cant." While the images in advertisements are somewhat exaggerated, we may not regard such images as unusual in that these same expressions are performed daily and express commonly understood aspects of feminine performance. Goffman argues, in the case of smiles, these are "more the offering of an inferior than a superior" and are more common among women than men. The puckish styling expresses a child-like quality for females. The knee bend and head cant may express a relaxed manner of trust in the situation, but one where the individual is "foregoing of full effort to be prepared and on the ready for the current social situation."

Some of these images are dated and current portrayals of males and females may be quite different. What is useful about Gorrman’s images in Gender Advertisements is his ability to focus on aspects of male and female performance that is usually overlooked. These are not dramatic images of the type that portray women as sex objects or males as aggressive, but images of tidbits of everyday life that each of us enacts daily.

6. Conclusion. Goffman's approach provides some examples and guidelines concerning how the self and personal style can be examined and analyzed to show the diversity of forms of action and interaction. Goffman shows how there are patterns to these, as much as to the norms and roles that have been part of the more conventional sociological approach. He does not provide an overall model of how the micro and macro approaches could be integrated. What he does present is the case for the autonomy and flexibility of the interaction order, that it can be examined systematically and meaningfully, and that this can be done within the social context of societal structures.

Goffman primarily analyzed the interaction order, constituting day-to-day and face-to-face interaction among acting individuals. While he recognized other orders and the structures associated with class, power, norms and roles, as individuals act in the interaction order there is a flexibility to these structures. That is, Goffman was interested in how performance is accomplished in practice, that is, how individuals interpret and perform roles, at the same time as they distance themselves from these. It is the flexibility of these that characterizes daily life and is the expression of individual personalities. Social change and social mobility may result from these aspects of role performance, although Goffman does not focus on this. But where a role is interpreted in many ways, or norms are stretched, this may lead to new roles and norms. For the individual, structures are a constraint, but they also present opportunities, and it is in role performance that these opportunities may be expressed.

Goffman does not connect the interaction order to other orders, such as the structures of society or intermediate level organizations, institutions, or systems. In that sense, Goffman’s analysis is incomplete, but perhaps no less complete than writers who analyze societal structures but not the interaction order. Connections between these are a concern of contemporary sociology – the issue of structure and agency.

The interaction approach examines the interaction order, because that is where society exists and is reproduced – in our daily activities. This reproduction is not necessarily in direct correspondence with the larger structures. That is, not all role enactment is an aspect of reproduction of structures – e.g. family roles are flexible and maintain family structures, but also alter them and provide new forms of family structure. It is important for sociologists to examine the assumptions underlying the interaction order (ethnomethodology) and consider how it works (symbolic interaction) in order to understand the larger structures. After all, it is the patterns and regularities that emerge from the myriad day-to-day interactions that constitute the structures of society. It is especially important to analyze these in a society with rapid social change and with high social mobility, since it is the performance of individuals in the interaction order that produce changes in these structures.

The symbolic interaction perspective did not explicitly consider women, and some feminists viewed this approach as male dominated, expressing how present structures of power are maintained through human interaction in the interaction order. Conflict theorists who consider the exercise of power as basic to understanding social relationships might have a similar approach. That is, symbolic interaction approaches tend to consider participants in the interaction order as more or less equal participants. This is not always the case for Goffman’s analysis, but the basic assumptions and methods of symbolic interactionists do not include power differentials. But this approach has proven to be flexible, and some more recent forms of symbolic interaction analysis have included situations where there is coercion, power differentials, or other forms of inequality. Goffman did some of this (asylums, prisons, male-female relations) and more recent contributions have come from Arlie Hochschild and Norman Denzin.