The critical distinction that Giddens makes is between structure and system. “Social systems are composed of patterns of relationships between actors or collectives reproduced across time and space. Social systems are hence constituted of situated practices”. In contrast to systems,
structures have only virtual existence but are recursively connected to the constituting practices of social systems as the medium and outcome of these practices (the ‘duality of structure’) [Giddens, 1981; p 26]. They exist, therefore, “only in so far as forms of social conduct are reproduced chronically in time and space” [1984a; p xxi]. His concern, therefore, is “first and foremost with reworking conceptions of human being and human doing” and understanding the “situated” character of social practices at the conjunction of three “moments of difference” - temporally, structurally and spatially [1984a; p xx; 1981; p 30].
Giddens is explicit about the notion of space that is implied by the idea that time-space relations are constitutive of social systems. He points to a continuity between Heidegger and Leibniz and argues that the Kantian portrayal of space and time as concepts of mind was a regressive step from the Leibnizian conception of space and time as “modes in which relations between objects and events are expressed” [1981; p 31]1. However, Giddens’ focus is upon the notion of ‘Being’
and he aims to connect this to the understanding of space and time. He achieves this through using the idea of ‘presence’, again from Heidegger. The idea of a four dimensional time (past, present, future and the animating term ‘presence’) he tentatively compares to conceptions of space-time in post-Newtonian physics (particularly Minkowski) with the aim of undermining the ‘imposed’ idea of space and time as a succession of measurable instants. The aim is to achieve the union between a unified conception ‘time-space’ and the ontological ‘presencing’; “To say this, in other words, is to reaffirm time-space as ‘presencing’ rather than as a ‘contentless form’ in which objects exist” [ibid.; p 34].
Although considerably more complex, the essential idea here bears similarities to Soja’s attempt to ‘socially animate’ the understanding of space and time (see chapter 2). For Giddens the aim is to understand the relationships between social systems and structures manifested in time-space and the role these relationships have, particularly in power relations and the development of
1 Note the continuity here with Soja’s argument that geography, “that most stiflingly cocooned of traditional disciplines” had to “reaching outside of its traditional Kantian cage” [Soja, 1987b; pp 289 and 291, and above p 32].
‘ontological security’. Despite the intensely theoretical nature of Giddens’ work he relates it to the possibility for empirical extension, for “[s]ocial theory has the task of providing conceptions of the nature of human social activity and of the human agent which can be placed in the service of empirical work, [t]he main concern of social theory [being] the same as that of the social sciences in general: the illumination of concrete processes in social life” [1984a; xvii]. He achieves this jump from philosophical exegesis to the formulation of empirical research possibilities by stating that;
It follows from what has been said about time-space relations in general that discussion of temporality can best be approached through grasping the interpenetration of presence or absence, the movement of individuals through time-space being seen as processes of ‘presencing/absencing’ [1981; p 37].
This ‘concretization’ of the Heideggerian themes of ‘presence’ and ‘Being’ into the ‘real world’ phenomena of presence and absence through the movement of individuals through space-time opens up the possibility for Giddens of using Hägerstrand’s ‘Time-Geography’ as a notational system accessible to empirical investigations. Also, it opens the connection between
presence/absence in space and the construction of actors’ performed identities; “The situated character of action in time and space, the routinization of activity and the repetitive nature of day- to-day life - these are phenomena which connect dimensions of the unconscious with Goffman’s analysis of co-presence” [1984a; p xxiv].
Co-presence and the physical context – space as ‘stage’
‘Co-presence’, whether focused or unfocused [see; Giddens, 1984a; pp 70-72 and Goffman, 1963; pp 17-19], involves encounters between one or more agents. “During the course of
[focused] encounters agents establish intimate contexts and engage in absorbing activities through the mutual co-ordination of talk, as well as the reflexive monitoring of facial expressions and bodily posture” [Cohen, 1989; p 96]. Such encounters, when embedded in the routinized character of day-to-day life establish social-relationships and social integration between individuals and the group. Cohen makes the “basic point” that such seriality implies a temporal ordering and, therefore, a spatial ordering, “in so far as face-to-face reciprocities are reproduced in diverse settings” [ibid.]. The key, then, for Giddens is to understand the conditions that shape
the opportunities for face-to-face interaction in time and space, the opportunities and constraints therefore, to presence-availability among actors [Cohen, 1989, p 96].
Giddens relates the importance of routinized physical co-presence directly to the spatiality of the body and argues, drawing on Merleau-Ponty, that “the body, and the experience of bodily movement, is the centre of forms of action and awareness which really define its [the body’s] unity” which, he argues, is geared into the “spatiality of situation”, the ‘here’ of the body relating to Heidegger’s conception of ‘being in the world’ rather than a “determinate series of co-
ordinates” [1984a; p 65].
Despite this understanding, which suggests that “the body [following Merleau-Ponty] does not ‘occupy’ time-space in exactly the same sense as material objects do”, there is an expressed concern with the physical environment in which interaction takes place which is inherited from Goffman’s work [ibid.]. The key is the understanding of the contextuality of co-presence. “By the term ‘context’...I mean those ‘bands’ or ‘strips’ of time-space within which gatherings take place…. Context includes the physical environment of interaction but is not something merely ‘in which’ interaction occurs” [1984a; p 71]. Giddens extends Goffman’s formulation, however, to emphasize the importance of the routinized character of interaction, thus extending the concept of context to include the temporal and spatial ordering (identified above by Cohen). In so doing he makes a link between the dramaturgical theory of Goffman, with its emphasis on the spatiality of the body and the presentation of ‘face’, and the time-geography of Hägerstrand which examines the spatial organization of encounters through time. Thus it is “the contextual organization of encounters [which] must be examined, since mobilization of time-space is the ‘grounding’ of all the above elements” [ibid.; p 73].
Goffman’s theory of the reflexive monitoring of action is related to Hägerstrand therefore because, as Giddens notes, the dramaturgical nature of the theory implies that ‘roles’ must be played out on a particular ‘stage’ upon which expected norms of conduct are enacted and “such settings of interaction are virtually always provided by a specific locale or type of locale in which regularized encounters take place” [ibid.; p 86]. The ‘space’ within the work of Goffman refers not to the material space of physical co-presence but the ‘social space’ of normative behaviours. So for example, “bystanders are usually expected not only not to exploit a situation of proximity of presence, ... but also actively to demonstrate inattention” [ibid.; p 75]. While there are clearly material elements to this ‘game playing’ (such as the behavioural means by which inattention or
eavesdropping are achieved) these are not dealt with by Goffman whose analysis does not penetrate below the level of the ‘stage’.
This physical level of analysis is related to Goffman’s distinction between the ‘situational’ aspects of activity and the ‘situated’ aspects. For example, the library is a place for study and not talking and to transgress this is to contravene the situational aspect of the activity of study [Goffman, 1963; p 22]. What I would term the physical aspects of the library space and the readers presence in it are “merely situated aspects of activity” - where the reader sits for example within the opportunity-space of the building. Similarly, in the description of institutions as “places such as rooms, suites of rooms, buildings, or plants in which activity of a particular kind regularly goes on” he places the emphasis on the activity, and sees its setting as habitual, not questioning the physical structure of the spaces themselves [Goffman, 1961; p 15]. In relation to the urban scale, also, streets are treated as “relatively unobstructed”, a presumption that also surfaces in Giddens’ claim that “in many ‘public places’, in jostling crowds on the street and so on, [...] there is no clear physical circumscribing of the conditions of co-presence” [Goffman, 1963; p 18; Giddens, 1984a; p 68]. Earlier examples in this thesis have demonstrated this to be an oversimplification, the configurational structure of street layouts being highly stratified both spatially and in terms of use along their length [see the examples in chapter 6.3]. There is throughout a lack of sensitivity to the role of physical space in ordering opportunities for co- presence and thereby influencing ‘presence-availability’.
I would argue that this is the case even in Goffman’s The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
which he argues focuses on “especially the kind of social life that is organized within the physical confines of a building or plant” [Goffman, 1959; p ix]. There he examines two ‘regions’ of action, a front region where the normative performance expected is given, and a back region, “a place, relative to a given performance, where the impression fostered by the performance is knowingly contradicted as a matter of course” [ibid.; p 97]. Although the back region is defined ‘relative to the performance’ it also has a material dimension; “any place that is bounded to some degree by barriers to perception”, whether that perception be auditory or visual (e.g. a glass as opposed to plasterboard wall) [ibid.; p 92]. So, for example, “very commonly the back region of a performance is located at one end of the place where the performance is presented, being cut off from it by a partition or a guarded passageway” allowing a performer to slip quickly from one to the other without revealing his ‘off-stage’ persona [ibid.; p 98].
Goffman gives a number of anecdotal examples; the waiter retiring to the kitchen letting slip his demure professional image; the mechanic who removes the car or watch from the presence of the customer so that work can be carried on without supervision; the hostess who uses the hall as a way to greet and say goodbye to guests individually and the kitchen as an ‘off-stage’ area from which hospitality is produced apparently effortlessly [ibid.; pp 104, 106-7, 120-21]. However, for Goffman these are simply ‘zones’. For example, in my own experience of working on a shop floor, the distinction between front and back regions was far more complicated than the ‘upstairs- downstairs’ notion that Goffman presents. Rather than a ‘zone of performance’ on the shop floor and a ‘zone of relaxation’ in the storeroom downstairs, both ‘regions’ (to use Goffman’s
terminology) were spatially fragmented according to the irregular physical structure of the building and the sight-lines afforded through the space (including those of the CCTV monitors which opened the front region to surveillance from the back).
Despite, therefore, his claim that “it is apparent that the backstage character of certain places is built into them in a material way”, he still has a simplistic notion of the effects of built structures on co-presence, which he sees as further distinct from ‘outside’ space that is treated as a separate category. Thus, “within [buildings] we find rooms that are regularly or temporarily used as back regions and front regions, and we find that the outer walls of the building cut both types of rooms off from the outside world” [ibid.; p 117]. Giddens has perhaps a more sensitive idea of the potentials of physical space, commenting that, “back regions in, say, settings of the shop floor include ‘odd corners’ of the floor, tea rooms, toilets and so on, as well as the intricate zonings of displacement of contact with supervisors which workers can achieve through bodily movement and posture” [1984a; p 128]. However, his illustration remains anecdotal and while there is an attempt to extend the concept of ‘regionalization’ to a generic scale this results in an oppositional treatment of front and back regions in terms of urban zoning which, while sensitive to the
importance of differential levels of through-movement in ‘ghetto areas’, again is not linked to the spatial morphology of the urban system2. The second part of this chapter will explore the role that
a material understanding of architectural space can play in illuminating the physical contextuality of Goffman’s (and Giddens’) theory.
2 A further instructive example of the potential for Space Syntax to clarify such issues would be the extensive work undertaken in just such ghetto or ‘back region’ areas of housing estates. This work is not dealt with here, because although important, it addresses an area of theory, particularly Newman’s ‘defensible space’, that does not strictly form part of the contemporary interest of space in social theory.