Ryan Schram's Anthrocyclopaedia

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• The people in the Portland coffeshop were saying themselves “We’re normal.”
• Orokaiva people are normal human beings because they aren’t like ejeba people, ol waitman.
• Workers at Signature Fashions think of themselves as middle-income people, neither rich nor poor.

There’s a problem with the idea that society is a rulebook

• Rules are statements, but social “rules” not always stated and don’t need to be stated to have force.
  • What kind of a rule is “unspoken”?
• People use the language of rules when they talk with each other, and all people do is talk with each other.
  • They may not be stating their ideas about rules in categorical terms, but they do judge and evaluate other people’s actions and their own in the course of interactions.

Every action sends a message. Everyday life is a conversation.

Social action is not just meaningful, it’s a message. When we appear in public, our appearance sends many messages, some of which is intentional and some which are unintentional.

                  | American | Auhelawa |
Ripped jeans | Hip, stylish, bohemian | Poor, rural, simple (bilibilij) |
Unwashed hair | Dirty, unhygienic | Respectful of father’s matrikin during a time of mourning |

We can distinguish between signals that we give intentionally and those we give off unintentionally (Goffman 1973, 2).

We also receive information from other people’s presentation and action

Every person receives feedback from the other people with whom they are interacting.

A: [casual, friendly] Hey what up.
B: 🤔
A: [serious, solemn] Oh… um, excuse me, Your Holiness. I am honored to be in your presence.

Obligatory reference to a classic early-aughts “wireless” ad tauting the company’s great cellular coverage area

“Jimbo” [Cingular Wireless]. 2006. BBDO. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0pL_CsK3Dk.

Cingular has no dropped calls. You don’t have to worry that a long pause means you said something stupid to a future in-law.

References and further reading

Goffman, Erving. 1973. The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Overlook Press.

Hendriks, Thomas. 2023. “On the Surprising Queerness of Norms: Anthropology with Canguilhem, Foucault, and Butler.” Anthropological Theory 23 (3): 235–54. https://doi.org/10.1177/14634996221117755.

Miller, Daniel. 2010. “Anthropology in Blue Jeans.” American Ethnologist 37 (3): 415–28. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1425.2010.01263.x.

Shange, Savannah. 2019. “Black Girl Ordinary: Flesh, Carcerality, and the Refusal of Ethnography.” Transforming Anthropology 27 (1): 3–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/traa.12143.