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The concept of the self

The concept of the self may be difficult to discuss, since the study of the self may difficult to do objectively, however several sociologists have tried including Charles Cooley, George Herbert Mead, and Erving Goffman, especially in regards to the concept of symbolic interactionism. According to Ritzer (2000), symbolic interactionism came out of the Chicago School of Sociology and is concerned with the development of the self in regards to the interaction of that self with others (p. 28). One of the first developers of this concept, Georg Simmel, believed that understanding the interaction between people was one of the major tasks of sociology.

Charles Cooley was considered to be a part of this Chicago school of thought. According to Ritzer (2000), Cooley, like Mead, refused to separate the consciousness of the self from the social context. He believed that the self was developed and shaped on a continuing basis through social interaction. This is known as the "looking-glass self". The second idea developed by Cooley in relationship to the "looking-glass self" was that of the "primary group". The "Primary group" includes those individuals that provide intimate, face-to-face interaction with an individual, and in so doing help develop the "looking-glass self" as it is reflected back from those individuals. This is an especially important concept in regards to the social development of children (p. 50). According to Ritzer (2000), Cooley also tried to get sociologists to place themselves in the spot of the "actors" to understand the reasons behind some social interactions. This was not a popular concept as it was seen to be too unscientific by many (p.50).

George Herbert Mead was also involved with symbolic interactionism, like Cooley, however he did not start out as a sociologist, but was a philosopher who taught social psychology to many graduate sociology students, who later put his lectures into print (after he died...

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The concept of the self. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 05:08, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1712861.html