2a. In the section “Misrepresentation,” Goffman describes how almost all perform

Question

2a. In the section “Misrepresentation,” Goffman describes how almost all performances require a little duping on the part of the performer: “Instead of merely doing his task and given vent to his feelings, he will express the doing of his task and acceptably convey his feelings. In general, then, the representation of an activity will vary in some degree from the activity itself, and therefore inevitably misrepresent it.” In your own words, describe why misrepresentation is such a consistent part of our performances.

2b. "The expressive coherence that is required in performances points out a crucial discrepancy between our all-too-human selves and our socialized selves. As human beings we are presumably creatures of variable impulse with moods and energies that change from one moment to the next. As characters put on for an audience, however, we must not be subject to ups and downs....A certain bureaucratization of the spirit is expected so that we can be relied upon to give a perfectly homogeneous performance at every appointed time" (p. 489).

Explanation / Answer

2a. It’s very natural for someone to misrepresent an activity as it is not possible for someone to narrate an activity as it happened but they could do so if they witness the activity at present and narrate it. For example, a commentator of a sport would narrate the activity as it is but he would also add his own adjectives and adverbs to make it more appealing for the audience he is addressing. Thus when one represents an event or activity, it is possible for one to either add something which didn’t happen or remove something which happened partly because one forgot it or they were not able to comprehend it, thus ending up in misrepresentation. One of the most intriguing and interesting fact is that the person who actually did the activity will also tend to misrepresent it, most of the times.

2b. We are all human beings and we are all emotional. No one’s performance would be consistent because we are made up of our physical self, family set-up, societal set-up such as culture, religion etc. All these factors impact the way we perform and live. We are not Gods to be consistently exhibit the same amount of emotions and performance. In my opinion, we could become more aware of our environment thus regulate our emotions and behaviours thus exhibiting more emotional intelligence but will it be same throughout will be a question mark.

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