Reviving classical attention to gathering times as sites of transformation and building on more recent microsociological work, this paper uses qualitative data to show how social occasions open up unexpected bursts of change in the lives of those attending. They do this by pulling people into a special realm apart from normal life, generating collective effervescence and emotional energy, bringing usually disparate people together, forcing public rankings, and requiring complex choreography, all of which combine to make occasions sites of inspiration and connection as well as sites of offense and violation. Rather than a time out from “real” life, social occasions hold an outsized potential to unexpectedly shift the course that real life takes. Implications for microsociology, social inequality, and the life course are considered.Via Marginal Revolutions
Is there anybody out there who has had such an experience at a party?
If anything, I find parties are times when people tend to fall back on old habits and patterns, rather than undergoing changes.
ReplyDeleteOf course, parties vary wildly. Maybe the folks I know just aren't going to the right kind of parties, and our revelries need more goats, ayahuasca, and deafeningly loud dance music, or something...
". . . forcing public rankings, and requiring complex choreography, all of which combine to make occasions sites of inspiration and connection as well as sites of offense and violation."
ReplyDeleteWow. Let me call my pulse. Tell us, Alice, how many times did you see "Fifty Shades of Grey"?
I wonder how the people she's snubbed at parties feel, reading this? They should all send her little notes: "You're right! What an inspiring violation! Let's do it again next year!"
That was, let me calm my pulse. Oops. Need to work on my complex choreography before I go to the next one.
ReplyDelete