SYMBOLIC

INTERACTIONISM
ERICCA T. AWID
WHAT IS SYMBOLIC INTERACTION THEORY?

• Symbolic interaction theory, called symbolic

interaction perspective, is a sociology theory that
seeks to understand humans' relationship with their
society by focusing on the symbols that help us give
meaning to the experiences in our life.
WHAT IS SYMBOLIC INTERACTION THEORY?

• This theory focuses on how social interactions and people

assign meanings to things around them based on
interpretation of their interactions with others.
• The symbolic interactionist perspective is based on the
notion that people make sense of their social worlds
through communication and social interaction - the
exchange of meaning through symbols and language. 
WHAT IS SYMBOLIC INTERACTION THEORY?

• The proponents of symbolic interaction theory argued

that the meaning we ascribe to the world around us
depends on our interactions with people, ideas, and
events.
• In simpler terms, symbolic interactionists believe that
our society is socially constructed by the meanings we
attach to social interactions and events.
 GEORGE HERBERT MEAD SYMBOLIC
INTERACTIONISM
• Sociologists believed George Herbert Mead, an American
philosophy professor, was the true founder of symbolic
interaction theory. His students gathered his teachings and
lectures and published a book titled Mind, Self, and Society
in his name.
• Shortly after this publication, Herbert Blumer, a follower of
mead, invented the term symbolic interactionism.
BLUMER ALSO IDENTIFIED THREE PREMISES FROM GEORGE HERBERT
MEAD'S SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM THEORY.
THESE PREMISES ARE:

1.Humans act toward people or things based on the meanings they

assign people or things.
2.The meanings we assign to people and things arise from our
social interactions with one another. Blumer argued that meaning
isn’t inherent in objects but formed through social interactions.
3.Humans adjust the meanings they assign people or things by
internally interpreting their interactions with the world.
• Social theorists asserted that there are two ways of
understanding social actions: Aktuelles verstehen and
erklarendeds verstehen. The first is direct observational
understanding, and the second is understanding the motive
behind an action. Max Weber rejected the structuralist view
that society exists independently of the people that make it
up and rather argued that a society is a product of social
actions.
• Aside from George Herbert Mead, Herbert Blumer,
and Max Weber, other theorists that contributed to
symbolic interactionism in sociology include Max
Weber, Charles Horton Cooley, Charles Darwin,
and William Isaac Thomas.