{"title":"Frame Analysis and Animal Studies: Erving Goffman's Overlooked Thesis on Animal Metacommunication and Mind","authors":"Colin Jerolmack, Abigail Westberry, Belicia Teo","doi":"10.1002/symb.715","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Erving Goffman's concept of framing is one of his most enduring contributions to social science. Despite the canonical status of Frame Analysis (1974) in multiple fields, few acknowledge its intellectual engagement with animal studies. It was Gregory Bateson, in an analysis of animal play, who first posited the idea of frames as metacommunicative propositions that signal the meaning of behavior. In this paper, we show that Goffman did not just opportunistically borrow the idea of framing from Bateson, but also advanced Bateson's thesis that nonhuman animals are capable of (re)framing the meaning of behavior. He emphasized that animals and humans could meta‐communicate with each other as well. Goffman polemicized against human exceptionalist theories of cognition and communication—not only in Frame Analysis, but also in unpublished remarks he delivered at a controversial conference on animal communication, and he suggested that the ability to meta‐communicate is a more appropriate index of mind than language. Although new research indicates that many species use “significant symbols” and have a “theory of mind,” most interactionists have not reckoned with the sociological implications of animals as “minded” social actors capable of metacommunication with each other—and with people.","PeriodicalId":47804,"journal":{"name":"Symbolic Interaction","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.5000,"publicationDate":"2024-06-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Symbolic Interaction","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1002/symb.715","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"SOCIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Erving Goffman's concept of framing is one of his most enduring contributions to social science. Despite the canonical status of Frame Analysis (1974) in multiple fields, few acknowledge its intellectual engagement with animal studies. It was Gregory Bateson, in an analysis of animal play, who first posited the idea of frames as metacommunicative propositions that signal the meaning of behavior. In this paper, we show that Goffman did not just opportunistically borrow the idea of framing from Bateson, but also advanced Bateson's thesis that nonhuman animals are capable of (re)framing the meaning of behavior. He emphasized that animals and humans could meta‐communicate with each other as well. Goffman polemicized against human exceptionalist theories of cognition and communication—not only in Frame Analysis, but also in unpublished remarks he delivered at a controversial conference on animal communication, and he suggested that the ability to meta‐communicate is a more appropriate index of mind than language. Although new research indicates that many species use “significant symbols” and have a “theory of mind,” most interactionists have not reckoned with the sociological implications of animals as “minded” social actors capable of metacommunication with each other—and with people.
期刊介绍:
The Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction is a social science professional organization of scholars interested in qualitative, especially interactionist, research. The society organizes panels and sessions at annual conferences such as the American Sociological Association and Midwest Sociology Society Annual Meetings, and each Spring holds the Couch-Stone Symposium. As the main voice of the Symbolic Interactionist perspective, Symbolic Interaction brings you articles which showcase empirical research and theoretical development that resound throughout the fields of sociology, social psychology, communication, education, nursing, organizations, mass media, and others.