Social interaction

“ But let us consider this accomplishment as detached from public business, and from its wonderful efficacy in popular assemblies, at the bar, and in the senate; can anything be more agreeable, or more endearing in private life, than elegant language? For the great characteristic of our nature, and what eminently distinguishes us from brutes, is the faculty of social conversation, the power of expressing our thoughts and sentiments by words. ”

“ The Working of the Social Mind.—Conversation in the group develops a common purpose. The two men are conscious of common desires and interests, or through a conflict of ideas the will of one subordinates the will of the other, and under the control of the joint purpose, which is now the social mind, they move toward one goal. This goal soon appears to be the objective point of a larger social mind, for other men and boys are converging in the same direction. ”

“ First of all, it is necessary to decide what one's personal idea of position is, whether this word suggests merely a social one, comprising a large or an exclusive acquaintance and leadership in social gaiety, or position established upon the foundation of communal consequence, which may, or may not, include great social gaiety. ”

“ Here a word must be said about the subjective aspect of society, which, in its objective aspect, as we have seen, is merely the struggle and process of adjustment. What is the relation of adjustment to sympathy and to understanding, to communication and to concerted purpose, to the evolution of a social constraint through which the community controls and shapes the individual, to cooperation and to social organization? ”

“ To this we may draw to meet him many men who could not be brought together at a late-hour, full-dress, evening entertainment. Authors, artists, clergymen, lawyers, statesmen, editors, doctors and capitalists, as well-237- as cultivated society women, financiers and philosophers, can all be brought together in easy and friendly social intercourse. ”

“ To render social life as interesting, as charming, as beautiful as possible, to make the social machinery run smoothly and without friction,—this is their aim. Such people give quality to social intercourse. They observe the little amenities of life with grace. They know how to enter a room and how to leave it. They convey by the bow with which they greet one on the street the proper degree of acquaintanceship or friendship. They dress with propriety. They take time by the forelock in the adoption of new devices for the entertainment of their friends. ”

“ The men that you meet with in all their variety of intellectual and moral nature, the political and social forces at work around you, the tendencies and aims of current speculation, will furnish to the well-trained mind, food for constant thought—for such thought as may elevate and brace the whole inner life by keeping it in perpetual contact with what is real and enduring beneath the shows of the fleeting hour. ”

“ Man and His Social Relations.—A study of society starts with the obvious fact that human beings live together. The hermit is abnormal. However far back we go in the process of human evolution we find the existence of social relations, and sociability seems a quality ingrained in human nature. Every individual has his own personality that belongs to him apart from every other individual, but the perpetuation and development of that personality is dependent on relations with other personalities and with the physical environment which limits his activity. ”

“ Perhaps you are responsible for the “socializing” of a very large group, most of the guests being strangers to each other, and you wish to break the ice and to get guests into the spirit that makes for easy and truly social conversation. ”

“ The terminology of relationship is only a specially favourable example by means of which to show the value of an attitude towards, and mode of treatment of, social facts which hold good, though less conspicuously, throughout the whole field of sociology. In social, as in all other kinds of human activity, psychological factors must have an essential part. I have myself in these lectures pointed to psychological considerations as elements in the problems with which the sociologist has to deal. ”

“ Business intercourse we cannot avoid; but we seek it for other ends than pleasure; social intercourse is that which we pursue for enjoyment only,—or, at least, pretend to. Hence, we call it specifically “Society;” and we distinguish it into certain fanciful grades, as “good society,” “the best society,” and “high life.” ”

“ They are the acts that have taken place because of association. The individual would not greet himself or shake hands with himself, or stop to talk with himself. They are dependent upon the presence of more than one person; they are phenomena of the group. Why do they shake hands and talk? First, because they feel alike and think alike, and sympathy and like-mindedness seek expression in gesture and language, and, secondly, because their mode of action is under the control of a social custom that directs specific acts. ”

“ We talk much of utilities, — but 'tis our manners that associate us. In hours of business, we go to him who knows, or has, or does this or that which we want, and we do not let our taste or feeling stand in the way. But this activity over, we return to the indolent state, and wish for those we can be at ease with; those who will go where we go, whose manners do not offend us, whose social tone chimes with ours. ”

“ A common purpose, the same society, the participation of the same amusements and pleasures, facilitate the formation of many interesting connexions. The opportunities of mutual intercourse are numerous: the social meetings are not hampered by the trammels of ceremony, and we readily acknowledge and enjoy mental and social talents wherever we meet with them. ”

“ I have always felt an aversion from this so-called life of society, which has for its object the cultivation of social relationships. Is there anything more terrible than a “call”? It affords an occasion for the exchange of the most threadbare commonplaces. ”

“ We may extend the social circle in which we move—a circle perhaps narrowed and restricted through circumstances beyond our control—by making intimate acquaintances, perhaps even close friends, among a society long departed, but which, when we have once learnt the trick of it, it rests with us to revive. ”

“ As a matter of fact, there is no stage of development where the feelings are net greatly modified. In view of the discovery that incipient social life often consists, not in working together or mutual help, but in play and festivity, we might well assert that the influence of group life on the likings, aversions and desires is more potent and pervasive than its influence on activities. ”

“ When perverted, it forms attachments for the low, vulgar, or vicious, and leads to bad company. Adapted to man’s [Pg 57] requisition for concert of action, co-partnership, combination, and community of feeling and interest, and is a leading element of his social relations. ”

“ To come into contact with the social side of people is broadening; it is educative. "To know people," says a writer, "you must see them at play." Social life can be made a study at the same time that it is made a pleasure. ”

“ It is our relations to others, that and the influence of our actions upon others, combined with the possibility of our natures being affected by the praise or censure of the social body to which we belong, which sets up the fact of responsibility. Conduct creates a social reaction, good or bad, agreeable or disagreeable, and the reacting judgment of society awakens in each of us a consciousness of responsibility, more or less acute, and more or less drastic, to society at large. ”

“ In social relations, in opportunities for culture, in friendships formed, in means of influence, in popular estimation, and even in temporal support, few positions in life have higher advantages or more agreeable surroundings. ”

“ All that was pronounced “good,” in man, in “the beginning” is innate in human nature. Social life and social relations are the life school in which this “good”-ness can be educed, strengthened, matured, in the individual. ”

“ The same criteria apply, but more critically, to social activities. Interactions among people involve their physical presence; their appearance as beautiful, or fit, or appropriate; their capability to articulate thoughts ”

“ To the group of facts that may be described as the simultaneous like-mental-activity of two or more individuals in communication with one another, or as a concert of the emotions, thought, and will of two or more communicating individuals, we give the name, the social mind. ”

“ The social problem—if for simplicity we may speak as though social tasks were one—is how to socialize ourselves to such degree that, without bankrupting all, each may have a secure lien upon a minimum share of nature's endowment for satisfying common human wants. ”

“ The interactions which take place among the members of a community so constituted are immediate and unreflecting. Intercourse is carried on largely within the region of instinct and feeling. Social control arises, for the most part spontaneously, in direct response to personal influences and public sentiment. It is the result of a personal accommodation rather than the formulation of a rational and abstract principle. ”

“ I cut it out of the paper afterwards—this is it, word for word:
"You who believe yourselves to be interested in social work, ask yourselves what it is that you are interested in really. I will tell you. Well, whether you know it or not, fundamentally what you care about is PEOPLE. Let us say it in a better way. It is FOLKS."
I never took my eyes off her face after that. For "folks" is a word I know. Better than any other word in the language, I know that word "folks." ”

“ The due subordination of self to others in certain relations, and of others to self in relations not less important, which is found in all such gatherings on a small scale and of comparatively uniform character—as in the passengers on an ocean-steamship, the members of a company of travelers, the fellows of a scientific expedition, or even a pleasure-party—is what is necessary for the well-being of the body social ”

“ Each individual would thus have the stereotype of his effective social life cast; each social being would have his effective life formulated, if one may so speak, by relation, always by relations, nothing but by relations—to that of all the rest, but in figures, and yet again, in nothing but figures. ”

“ And yet I feel sure that the social side is no less genuine in its claims upon us than any other. It seems to me that I might interest myself socially, but I am puzzled by the intricacies of the situation. ”

“ Otherwise, as we have pointed out, the conflicts in the acquirement of habit and character on the part of individuals would be so great that there would be no possibility of their working together harmoniously in a common social life. ”

“ This relation, in which the mutual rendering of services is unforced and neither individual subordinated, becomes the predominant relation throughout society, in proportion as the industrial activities predominate. Daily determining the thoughts and sentiments, daily disciplining all in asserting their own claims, while forcing them to recognize the correlative claims of others, it produces social units whose mental structures and habits mould social arrangements into corresponding forms. ”

“ In the establishment, then, of this interesting relation, seek by all means an individual who appears to entertain views of social life, as much as possible, like your own. Does he find his happiness in going abroad, or in lounging? ”

“ Thus Best Society is not a fellowship of the wealthy, nor does it seek to exclude those who are not of exalted birth; but it is an association of gentle-folk, of which good form in speech, charm of manner, knowledge of the social amenities, and instinctive consideration for the feelings of others, are the credentials by which society the world over recognizes its chosen members. ”

“ It is capable of presenting life as a connected whole and of showing the interplay of influences, the action of values on attitudes. It can reveal the predominant wishes in different temperaments, the incidents constituting turning points in life, the processes of sublimation or transfer of interest from one field to another, the effect of other personalities in defining situations and the influence of social organizations like the family, the school, the acquaintance group, in forming the different patterns of life-organization. ”

“ But social communication involves sooner or later differences of opinion, conflict of testimony and frequent evidences of a variety in the experience of different people. At last it comes slowly to one's mind that the experiences of another consciousness, external to mine, cannot themselves be identical with the objects of my experience as mine. The individuals of the social world come to be sharply separated. ”

“ I pointed out an important law in Social Psychology, namely, that greatness of individuality is inversely proportional to the mass of the social aggregate. ”

“ But the formation of habits of belief, desire and judgment is going on at every instant under the influence of the conditions set by men's contact, intercourse and associations with one another. This is the fundamental fact in social life and in personal character. ”

“ The individual and social instincts,—the one a most potent factor for individual endeavor, for growth, aspiration, self-realization; the other an equally potent factor for mutual helpfulness and social well-being. ”

“ We shall see that, in the light of the specific and natural tendencies toward social behavior which are part of man's original equipment, this sharp psychological isolation between the individual and the group is an altogether unwarranted assumption. ”

“ Constant Factors in Social Phenomena.—Our study of social life has made it plain that it is a complex affair, but it has been possible to classify society in certain groups, to follow the gradual extension of relations from small groups to large, and to take note of the numerous activities and interests that enter into contemporary group life. ”