Introduction
Cities are often described as the loneliest places on earth. Sociologist Georg Simmel sought out to demonstrate how cities and their processes change an individual and their mentality. This includes a person’s perspectives, behaviours, attitudes and also the city’s ‘personality’. Using his essay, ‘The Metropolis and Mental Life’, we look at how the circumstances following the death of Kitty Genovese supports Simmel’s study with the help of the social psychological phenomenon ‘the bystander effect’. Simmel’s perspective is also supported by present day examples and is still very relevant to this day, influencing other sociologist’s studies.
Simmel believed city life and its various aspects altered people’s behaviours, attitudes and outlook on life. His study is described …show more content…
(Giddens and Sutton, 2017:211). This is seen in situations such as when an individual is standing at a bus stop with other people but they do not interact with them. However, they will notice their bus arriving. They are so accustomed to their surroundings, they, as mentioned in Simmel’s The Metropolis and Mental Life (1903, cited in Giddens and Sutton, 2017, pp. 211), adopt a “seen-it-all-before” attitude; thus make no conscious effort to intercommunicate with those around them. Despite Simmel noting that inhabitants aren’t inherently indifferent to each other, they do avoid contact with one another – physically and emotionally in order to protect themselves from the city’s demands. According to Simmel’s The Metropolis and Mental Life essay (1903, pp. 12), “instead of reacting emotionally, the metropolitan type reacts primarily in a rational manner, thus creating a mental predominance through the intensification of consciousness, which in turn is caused by it.” They fear losing their individuality because they
Cities are often described as the loneliest places on earth. Sociologist Georg Simmel sought out to demonstrate how cities and their processes change an individual and their mentality. This includes a person’s perspectives, behaviours, attitudes and also the city’s ‘personality’. Using his essay, ‘The Metropolis and Mental Life’, we look at how the circumstances following the death of Kitty Genovese supports Simmel’s study with the help of the social psychological phenomenon ‘the bystander effect’. Simmel’s perspective is also supported by present day examples and is still very relevant to this day, influencing other sociologist’s studies.
Simmel believed city life and its various aspects altered people’s behaviours, attitudes and outlook on life. His study is described …show more content…
(Giddens and Sutton, 2017:211). This is seen in situations such as when an individual is standing at a bus stop with other people but they do not interact with them. However, they will notice their bus arriving. They are so accustomed to their surroundings, they, as mentioned in Simmel’s The Metropolis and Mental Life (1903, cited in Giddens and Sutton, 2017, pp. 211), adopt a “seen-it-all-before” attitude; thus make no conscious effort to intercommunicate with those around them. Despite Simmel noting that inhabitants aren’t inherently indifferent to each other, they do avoid contact with one another – physically and emotionally in order to protect themselves from the city’s demands. According to Simmel’s The Metropolis and Mental Life essay (1903, pp. 12), “instead of reacting emotionally, the metropolitan type reacts primarily in a rational manner, thus creating a mental predominance through the intensification of consciousness, which in turn is caused by it.” They fear losing their individuality because they