II. SEVEN SOCIABLE CONVENTIONS

The idea that conventions shape sociable conversation became clear only recently. It grew out of two parts of the research.

The first of these was what we called “motive-style”. We defined motive-style as an organizing, energizing constellation of demand, expectation and performance that serves to model behavior in a particular situation.

The motive-style does for the sociable group what a motive does for an individual: when aroused, it propels persons forward into action, signaling which topics and sentiments are appropriate to include in the conversation and which ones are inappropriate or irrelevant.

Unlike work-oriented interaction, sociable interaction offers no formal goal to give structure to the conversation. Instead, it is the pathway that gives structure. Participants “take off” from some commonly recognized point of departure, and find their way because the path is familiar. Both the “motive” (type of gratification to be attained; emotions to be expressed) and the “style” (approved means of achieving the gratification; kind of belief to be expressed) contribute to the definition of “what to do”. It is the conventional fusion of motive and style that serves to pattern behavior and generate movement.

The definition of motive-style could also serve as a definition of sociable convention.

In the study, we treated motive-styles as expressions of positive or negative affect. For persons and objects not present, we distinguished between enthusiasm and mockery. If the conversation expressed positive feelings between partners, we described the motive-style as affiliative.

The second aspect of the research that contributed to the idea of sociable convention was the development of party type. We were able to classify all 60 parties, using categories based upon the indicators of festivity, thoughtful appraisal and identity maintenance. I would say now that each of these indicators represented one or more sociable conventions.

Working from these two classifications, we developed a list of 7 conventions that apply to sociable conversation. It seems to me that these seven conventions still have validity today for the description of sociable interaction, although they may be only a beginning: there is no limit to the number of additional conventions that may be discovered.

1) Mockery:

a style in which participants join together to mock others. Most often, this means that members of an in-group mock members of an out-group having special significance for them.

2) Festivity:

playful, perhaps boisterous, conversation that expresses a sense of having fun.

3) Thoughtful appraisal:

serious discussion of topics that are important to participants.

4) Prospecting:

topics chosen are ones for which information is widely available, although perhaps not of great interest, and people who do not know each other use the topics to find a way of connecting with one another.

5) Self disclosure:

participants engage in self-disclosure and empathy, often in a dyad. They may or may not have been acquainted prior to the party.

6) Routine identity-maintenance:

individuals talk in a friendly way about their current activities.

7) Tending the parish:

people who share membership in some school, work group, profession, institution, community, or other collective unit come together in sociable activity that complements their collective enterprise.

A more detailed discussion of each of the seven conventions follows

© 2008 Jeanne Watson Eisenstadt. All Rights Reserved
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