Symbolic Interactionism | Sociology | Chegg Tutors

hi my name is Fallon I'm a tutor through Chegg tutors I'm here today to talk to you about symbolic interactionism which is the subject in sociology it is a theory developed by Charles Cooley and George Herbert Mead the name symbolic interactionism actually wasn't developed until one of Meade's students Herbert Blumer developed it basically what symbolic interactionism is is it's a way to explain social behavior in terms of how people interact with each other through symbols so let's break that down a little bit so basically what made thought was that your sense of self develops through social interactions that you have with other people and those interactions are based on the symbols that you view during that time so the way you view yourself and think of yourself is developed through the way that you act and interact with other people and those interactions whenever you communicate with someone are in interact with someone else the result of that really depends on how you interpret symbols like languages and gestures according to the meaning that they have for you so let's go through some examples just to kind of illustrate this for you for example colors can be a huge symbol in day-to-day life and they mean different things to different cultures culture is a huge factor in the way that we interpret different symbols so let's talk about the color red for example in China red is a huge color of celebration and good luck and the picture that I have here is actually from a Chinese wedding they wear red in their weddings because again it's supposed to symbolize good luck and happiness where as opposed to here in the United States we use red as the sign of danger a lot so if you are in China you interpret the symbol of the color red differently and that affects your view of what's going on another symbol would be the thumbs up symbol in the US and a lot of Western cultures it's used as a sign of good job you know keep doing what you're doing but in other places like Greece and Russia it's seen as an insult so again a different way to view a symbol affects the outcome of an interaction again this is more of a status symbol so if you see somebody with a coach purse your interpretation of that symbol is that they are of a higher class doctors coats are another example of a symbol usually when someone's wearing a doctor's coat we give them respect we assume that is the symbol of high education and that affects the way we interact with them long hair particularly in men has long been seen as a symbol of rebellion in a lot of cultures and that can affect people's perceptions of them and the way that they interact with them and our last example is a handshake so a handshake is a really good example for symbolic interactionism because your perception of the handshake can very different depending on your culture depending on the situation that you're in so for example if you are someone who likes strong handshakes and the person that you shake hands with as a weak handshake then that symbol has now given you a different perception of that person or if you if it's a close family member say and you want to give them a hug and instead they go to give you a handshake that's going to affect your relationship with and your interactions with that person so to sum everything up symbolic interactionism explain social behavior in terms of the way people interact with each other through symbols you have any more questions feel free to check out my profile on check tutors I would love to help you out thanks

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Length: 4min 20sec (260 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 10 2016