Whom Are We Being? Conveying Symbolic Interactionism Through Gesture

• In Event: 3223 - Teaching and Learning Symposium: Lightning Presentations of Teaching Technique

Abstract

This quick, minimal-preparation class exercise uses interactive demonstration with a student volunteer to explain and convey symbolic interaction. Following the short exercise, a familiar classic Disney film example provides specific context for theoretical tenets.

Learning Objective: Cement takeaway idea that human beings are social meaning-makers

Approach Used: Visual front-of-room demonstration with single student volunteer; remaining students provide demonstration’s verbal interpretation

Exercise: Instructor requests a class volunteer. While volunteer is seated in a chair at the front of room, the instructor successively offers zer hand to the student in a variety of meaningful ways (fist bump, high five, queenly kiss, handshake, and dance request; includes one non-symbolic gesture for contrast). As the volunteer responds to each, instructor freezes the scene, asking the class to describe what is occurring and what roles each actor plays. After student returns to seat, instructor demonstrates same gestures in isolation, showcasing how slight changes in hand placement imply so much about scene, society, relationship, and expectation (S.I. in action).

Lesson Conveyed:
a. Definition and demonstration of symbolic interaction; differentiation between symbolic and non-symbolic interaction
b. S.I.’s three main tenets:
1. Humans act toward things on basis of meanings they ascribe to them
2. Meaning does not exist in a vacuum (neither intrinsic nor strictly psychological); meaning arises out of (or is derived from) interaction
3. Meanings are handled in and modified through interpretive processes

Utility: This quick exercise is easy to adopt and integrate into classrooms, shows students new esoteric concepts in action before they learn them theoretically, relies on no prior student sociological knowledge (allowing their free contribution to discussion), requires no props beyond a volunteer and a chair, and engages the whole room. This is a good exercise for the beginning of a semester and particularly useful for instructors of Introduction to Sociology courses.

Author

• Chelsea Rae Kelly, University of Georgia