First a generalization, then the observations that led me to it in my
musings this morning.
Socialization is in large measure the management of unintended side effects.
"Don't interrupt! Can't you see we're talking?" Well, the kid isn't
interrupting, in the sense that interrupting is not the intended result.
OK, interrupting is a prerequisite to being listened to and understood, but
interrupting a conversation is not the controlled perception.
"Conversation" may not even be a perception that the kid recognizes yet as
controllable.
Endless examples. "Don't push!" (But I just want some ice cream.) "You hurt
Danny's feelings."
Recently, I visited an old friend in London, Ontario. She's an
anthropologist. She told a story that she had heard from Keith Basso,
another anthropologist and long time friend whom I haven't met. If I
remember correctly her contextualization of the story, this was maybe 25
years ago, when he had been working with the Apache only five years or so.
He's riding in a friend's pickup. As they pass the trading post, the friend
says (in Apache) "Oh, there's auntie so and so. We should stop and give her
a ride." That sounds like a good idea, so they pull up and park the pickup.
Auntie is sitting on the porch with a big bag of groceries next to her.
They walk up the steps, right past auntie, through to the back of the
store. He stops, facing the wall. There are some posters and things tacked
up. "Pretty hot today," he says (in Apache). Long pause. "Yep. Pretty hot"
comes the answer back from Auntie. Another long pause. The pauses are part
of being respectful in Apache. "Groceries are heavy," he says. Pause. "Yep.
Groceries are heavy." ... "Reckon Jim's working." ... "Yep. Jim's working."
(Jim is her husband.) ... "Guess I'll go now." He walks back to the
pickup. As he gets in, she stands, picks up the bag of groceries. "Guess
I'll go with you." She climbs in the pickup with them and they give her a
ride home with her groceries.
Explication: If he had asked her outright if she needed a ride, or in any
other way offered her a ride, it could have put her in an untenable
situation if, in fact, she was waiting for her husband to come pick her up.
By Apache standards of politeness she couldn't refuse his offer. But then
Jim would be greatly ticked off if she wasn't there, after he drove 50
miles out of his way to come get her.
Amid the unfamiliar expectations of a different culture, it is sometimes
easier to see the importance of managing unintended side effects.
Here, Irving Goffman's astute observations of how people manage appearances
would be relevant. He was kind of like a Martian visiting among us. Had his
problems, but a keen eye and ear.
Perhaps this can be understood as learning about controlled environmental
variables (CEVs), learning what it means that they are in an environment
shared with other controllers; and learning about the actions of other
controllers as aspects of a CEV. The simplest thing can carry quite a
complicated freight of expectations in the minds of others. "That's my
bookmark you've got there." "Oops, sorry." She thought it was just a scrap
of paper lying around. It's the flap from an envelope. Years ago, the
envelope had brought a letter. It had the scent of roses. The book contains
a poem that she liked, the one who sent the letter. He has always kept the
place marked, at first with the letter. That was lost, and all that remains
is the flap of the envelope. He imagines that there still lingers on it the
scent of roses. He cannot find a way to tell all this to his wife, about
this rememberance of one lost. But she gets the message that there is
something special about this scrap, this bookmark, though she doesn't know
what.
And so on. Most of it not so drowned in bathos as that, to be sure, but any
CEV might be invested with (if that's an OK way to put it) the
unpredictable controlled perceptions of other controllers.
We see the honing of communication skills in CSGNET exchanges. Well, in
some of them. And a good number of unintended side effects.
In this season of many controlled perceptions, I wish you each a splendid
experience of the return of the light, however that symbolism may suit
itself to the world of your perceptions.
Bruce Nevin