Manuel
A. Beltran
Micro
sociology is something I believe everyone experiences every day. This however
may be different for different people depending on their cultural backgrounds.
As Goffman described why people do the things they do, social forces influence
people greatly. Through time and perhaps even the habit of doing things or
reacting to situations a certain way, this becomes a norm or custom.
I
think people can be influenced by social forces to not do certain things or
participate in activities in some cases. This then becomes the norm or custom.
Having worked for political campaigns and organizations I have learned a lot
from simply canvassing neighborhoods and working Election Day. Coming from a
Latino family I grew up listening to conversations about politics as if they
were dirty, unfair and just something one must stay away from. However as I got
older and saw that this was a way to make change I decided to become more
involved. Yet as I did so I ran into much of the same sentiment I found at
home. In México there is a saying that roughly translated means why
vote, the PRI is going to win anyway(PRI is a political party in México
which had been in power for decades and recently returned to power). While
registering people to vote in predominantly Mexican neighborhoods I struggled
greatly because of this sentiment.
When
I would knock doors and talk to people, they would respond hesitantly. They
many times would refuse to even register, either because they were worried about
providing personal information on a form and give to a stranger or because they
saw it as a waste of time. This latter aspect usually occurred in either
districts or wards where the elected official was an incumbent or challenger.
In both scenarios, people saw registering and voting as a waste of time. People
felt either that the elected official, if he or she was an incumbent, had not
done anything and nothing had changed from their voting in the past. The other
argument was that even if the candidate I was canvassing for was a challenger,
they would assume based on the PRI example I mentioned earlier, that the new
candidate, even with their vote would not change anything.
On
the flip side, when I ran into people who did want to register or were
registered, they were seen by their peers as strange or out of the ordinary, at
best as an idealist. In this case this type of socialization is not so great
for people. However it shows how people can become socialized to not do
something without actually having to say “do not do x, y, and z”. During my
canvassing experiences, I rarely heard someone tell others not to vote
specifically but the comments made with respect to voting, registering or
participating in any way had the same affect. In addition to the comments made
discouraging such behavior, the way people who did were ostracized also provided
the same function of telling people not to vote without telling them
so.
A. Beltran
Micro
sociology is something I believe everyone experiences every day. This however
may be different for different people depending on their cultural backgrounds.
As Goffman described why people do the things they do, social forces influence
people greatly. Through time and perhaps even the habit of doing things or
reacting to situations a certain way, this becomes a norm or custom.
I
think people can be influenced by social forces to not do certain things or
participate in activities in some cases. This then becomes the norm or custom.
Having worked for political campaigns and organizations I have learned a lot
from simply canvassing neighborhoods and working Election Day. Coming from a
Latino family I grew up listening to conversations about politics as if they
were dirty, unfair and just something one must stay away from. However as I got
older and saw that this was a way to make change I decided to become more
involved. Yet as I did so I ran into much of the same sentiment I found at
home. In México there is a saying that roughly translated means why
vote, the PRI is going to win anyway(PRI is a political party in México
which had been in power for decades and recently returned to power). While
registering people to vote in predominantly Mexican neighborhoods I struggled
greatly because of this sentiment.
When
I would knock doors and talk to people, they would respond hesitantly. They
many times would refuse to even register, either because they were worried about
providing personal information on a form and give to a stranger or because they
saw it as a waste of time. This latter aspect usually occurred in either
districts or wards where the elected official was an incumbent or challenger.
In both scenarios, people saw registering and voting as a waste of time. People
felt either that the elected official, if he or she was an incumbent, had not
done anything and nothing had changed from their voting in the past. The other
argument was that even if the candidate I was canvassing for was a challenger,
they would assume based on the PRI example I mentioned earlier, that the new
candidate, even with their vote would not change anything.
On
the flip side, when I ran into people who did want to register or were
registered, they were seen by their peers as strange or out of the ordinary, at
best as an idealist. In this case this type of socialization is not so great
for people. However it shows how people can become socialized to not do
something without actually having to say “do not do x, y, and z”. During my
canvassing experiences, I rarely heard someone tell others not to vote
specifically but the comments made with respect to voting, registering or
participating in any way had the same affect. In addition to the comments made
discouraging such behavior, the way people who did were ostracized also provided
the same function of telling people not to vote without telling them
so.