ABSTRACT
The importance of Cooley’s idea is not immediately apparent in Goffman’s writing. As already indicated, although seemingly clear on the surface, there are many twists and turns. Read with care, the structure of his most popular work, Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, reveals what seems to be two different authors. The first half of the book deals with performances and dramaturgical staging, rituals of theatre (Goffman the Structuralist). Behavior is scripted by the social situation, motives are not important. The first act lulls the sociological reader into the Durkheimian fantasy.
