Symbolic interactionism is a theory that views society as the product of interactions between individuals. It proposes that 1) people act based on the meanings assigned to things through social interactions, 2) meaning arises through social interactions and language, and 3) an individual's thoughts are modified by their own interpretation of symbols and perspective taking of others. According to symbolic interactionism, the self and reality are social constructions that emerge through communication and the shared interpretation and understanding created between people through symbolic interactions like language.

1. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
Introduction to Communication Theories
By Anne Cortez | Adamson University

2. Discussion Outline
•Interpersonal Communication
•Symbolic Interaction
•Creation of the Self
•Summary

5. Our thoughts, self-concept, and the wider community we live in are created through communication—symbolic interaction. -George Herbert Mead

6. George Herbert Mead was an influential philosophy professor at the University of Chicago, but he never published his ideas.
After his death, his students published his teachings in Mind, Self, and Society.

7. We find ourselves NOT through introspection,
but through interaction with other people.

8. SYMBOLIC INTERACTION- The ongoing use of language and gestures in anticipation of how the other will react; a conversation.

10. Communication is the most human and humanizing activity in which people are engaged. -Herbert Blumer
Herbert Blumer - Mead’s chief disciple-
coined the term symbolic interactionism.

11. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
THINKING
LANGUAGE
MEANING

12. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
Premise 1: Humans act toward people or things on the basis of the meanings they assign to those people or things

13. art
terror prof

14. SYMBOL- a stimulus that has a learned meaning and value for people

15. Reality is a social construction.
(Berger & Luckmann, 1996)

16. Principles of Early Economic Systems
•Reciprocity
•Redistribution
•Householding
SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION
SHARED MEANING
The communal creation of the social world in which we live.
People’s common interpretation or mutual understanding of what a verbal or nonverbal message signifies.

17. “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”

18. What is reality?

19. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
Premise 2: Meaning arises out of the social interaction that people have with each other; meaning is negotiated through language

20. Words are symbols. Words do not have inherent meaning. We assign meaning to words.

21. SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION
STIMULUS
INTERPRETATION
RESPONSE
Meaning Making Process

22. The words that we use have default assumptions.

24. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
Premise 3: An individual’s interpretation of symbols is modified by his or her own thought processes

26. Thinking is an inner conversation. Mead called this inner dialogue minding.

27. Taking the role of the other- the process of mentally imagining that you are someone else who is viewing you

28. “You never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them.”

29. The SELF is the joining point between the individual and the society. Communication is the link that allows the intersection to occur.

30. THE SELF: I and Me
I - the spontaneous, driving force that fosters all that is novel, unpredictable, and unorganized in the self
Me - the objective self; the image of self seen when one takes the role of the other

31. Looking-glass self
The mental self-image that results from taking the role of the other; the objective self; me.

32. We are born with no sense of self.
Self arises in interaction with others.

33. Generalized other- the composite mental image a person has of his or her self based on societal expectations and responses

34. SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
•Humans act toward people or things on the basis of the meanings they assign to those people or things
•Meaning arises out of the social interaction that people have with each other; meaning is negotiated through language
•An individual’s interpretation of symbols is modified by his or her own thought processes

35. Our thoughts, self-concept, and the wider community we live in
are created through communication—symbolic interaction.
We use language and meaning making to create the self and the reality.

36. REFERENCES
Em Griffin, A First Look at Communication Theory, 2006. Stephen Littlejohn and Karen Foss, Communication Theory, 2010.

37. QUESTIONS?