Presentation Of Self Theory

Lights! Camera! Action! Everyday? Have you ever felt as though you were expected to act a certain way in public or around certain people? Some sociologists believe in a theory known as the "presentation of self" theory, which states that people act certain ways to control how they are presented in society or to a specific group of people. When considering this theory, one can apply to today 's society easily. With the internet at an all time high, social media websites have made it even easier to control who sees what we do and how we do it, it is almost impossible to deny that the previous mentioned theory does stand in today 's society. The question that is then put before us is, how exactly can one link a book written in the late …show more content…
This book is about his theory on dramaturgical framework and social interaction among people in everyday life. He had an interesting theory that humans "perform" in their day to day life. Goffman believed that an individual 's personality is created by their interactions with other people in their everyday life. He said that people live their lives as if they are an actor and the public world is their stage. With that being said, all other people around them are the audience and time spent alone would be seen as time spent "backstage." Of course, a person may not feel as though they are acting all the time. Goffman 's theory doesn 't state that people do this acting on purpose, but that the social status and roles that society has given us has made it impossible for us to not act somewhat different when we are around other …show more content…
Programs such as Photoshop and Instagram have made it much easier to change the way a person looks so that someone may go much further than just makeup and clothing to alter their appearance so that they may impress someone or appear a certain way to their peers. Although it may seem as though appearance is the only thing people change about themselves on the internet, that is not the case. People also may post different statuses on Facebook to make sure that people are aware of the big and interesting things they are doing. This is why people share pictures from their vacations, or of what they ate that day or of the dozen roses their boyfriend sent them for their birthday. One may not realize it, but they are sharing these pictures and stories so that other people think they are interesting, funny, clever, etc. Everything a person posts on a social media website is their "performance," they are presenting themselves in a certain way and the internet allows them to have almost one-hundred percent control over