Microsociology is the study of a small group within the larger society. Goffman interprets this theory in two aspects: front and back stage. To understand these two concepts, we need to understand that the way a person act is all based on a performance. Everyone wants to make a good impression and perform well in the society. So everyone would want to continue with the social norm and follow the pattern the society had embedded but there are always exceptions that allow people to break the social norms. Allowing people to break away from the social norm gives society a different view how they would judge an individual.
Front stage consist of an audience, basically there are people watching your actions. Ideally, you would want to put on a good performance so that you can give a good impression to the audience. However unlike back stage, front stage needs resources to improve the performance: props, personal appearance and mannerisms. Props can be the actual physical environments. Where is the performance being held? Depending on the setting, it affects how you perform such as being at home in private or being in public. Personal appearance is how a person put himself or herself together. You need to consider how you physically look as well how you vocalize yourself. Lastly, mannerisms can be verbal and non verbal. How to speak to your friends is not the same way you talk to your parents. One important concept of front stage that people tend to oversee is that a person can be too involve in the performance at the front stage that along the way, they tend to become the performance versus just being a performer. It is important to understand that a person can forget that it is just a performance.
Back stage however, is more hidden. No one really knows what is going behind the scene. This is a time for you to practice the presentation. This gives the performer a break to step out their character and be their “true” self. This allows for the performer to take a break from the scene and be themselves without any judgment. This can be seen as more of a relaxation time for the performer and not worry about impressing the audience because there is no audience present.
There is this concept to not break social norms or else people would look at you differently. A way a person performs is being judge by society. Just imagine being in lecture just taking notes because in society, that was what we were taught to do in a lecture setting. Then all of a sudden, something out of the norm occur. Of course everyone’s initial instinct is to judge that person on his or her performance. For my blog, I was able to find a video that dealt with that exact story line. A student thought it was funny to play a prank in the class along with various settings.
He basically was wearing a Power Ranger suit underneath his clothes and during lecture; his beeper came off and gets undressed himself in front of the class. Everyone in the class looked at him and laughed because he was putting on a performance that no one expected to happen. This is the front stage performance that we can see Goffman describe that he was able to entertain and impress the audience by dressing up at a Power Ranger in class. At the same time, we have to consider the back stage prep that this individual had done to prepare for this performance.