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Firstly, in order to answer this question, my case study will be a Job interview I experienced at “Toys R Us”, one of the largest toy retailers in the world. This will relate to the question at how when attaining employment, the big business corporations will want you, as an employee of theirs to change in order to suit the business environment. Also, within the essay the theorists I am going to refer to will be, Ervin Goffman, J. Berger and Marx. I will explore Goffman’s theories of individual identity and group relations. His perspective provides new insight into the nature of social interaction and the psychology of the individual. Within Berger I will relate to his theory of publicity and it effects not only everyday life but within the individual. In Marx I will explore his theory of capitalism. In my opinion, the question does have many elements of truth behind it. In today’s society, many people could not truthfully say that they do not conform. By this I mean that you do not follow such things as cultural stereotypes or buy into the new trend or change ourselves in order fit in as we would prefer or because we think other people have bought into it. For example, the process of establishing social identity, then, becomes closely allied to the concept of the “front”, which is described by Goffman as “that part of the individual’s performance which regularly functions in a general and fixed fashion to define the situation for those who observe the performance”. The front acts as a vehicle of standardisation, allowing for others to understand the individual on the basis of projected character traits. Goffman is suggesting that when we first meet someone we begin to assess his or her manner, speech, style and vocabulary. In other words, concurring with Goffman, we evaluate each other in accordance to commonly held perceptions about income, status and class. Therefore the lack of freedom stems from the fact that we strive in order to give a different perception about ourselves rather be just our normal selves. This can be related to such things as consumerist culture or impression management. This explores how our identity, our lifestyle or our appearance can be changed or structured by newspapers, magazines and advertisement pictures. These advertisements and magazines regularly project us, the hearty consumer, in a better light, so it is impossible to be that more interesting, that more aesthetically pleasing, that more lavish and that more fortunate person. It is our own fault as through consumerist society we have bought into such things as “buy this product, become the fantasy, you are what you buy” (Mary McDonnell 2001:Handout lecture 2). By this the reader can understand that such marketing ploys like the ones above actually work against us and restrict our freedom into buying what we feel. But rather change our minds into buying what we feel our colleagues would think is nice or buy something that gives other people a different impression about what we really are.
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