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George Herbert Mead: identity, social relations and objects
With this article we close the series dedicated to the American pragmatists. If you have not had the opportunity to do so, I recommend that you read previously those dedicated to Charles Sanders Pierce, William James y John Dewey.
George Herbert Mead (1863 - 1931) had a strong religious background influenced by his father, a parish priest in a congregation in South Hadley (Massachusetts). His first job was as a professor of theology at a seminary in Oberlin, Ohio. After a brief stint as a schoolteacher, Mead worked for some years as a surveyor for the Wisconsin Central Railroad Company. He enrolled at Harvard University, where he studied psychology and philosophy. There he met William James, although they did not study together, they became friends, and Mead moved into his home, where he tutored his children. At Harvard he had a long identity crisis, questioning his Christian origins and background. He left for Europe in 1888 without a graduate degree.
He obtained his doctorate at the University of Berlin, where he developed a more realist approach influenced by the social democratic labour movement. He returned to the United States in 1894 to work at the University of Michigan, where he befriended Dewey and followed him to Chicago. There Mead eventually moved away from his religious roots, but maintained an activist spirit, participating in marches in support of women's suffrage and other progressive causes.
Like the other pragmatists, Darwin had a great influence on his thinking; in fact, Mead's work is a kind of synthesis of Darwin's evolutionary ideas, Dewey's functionalist psychology and James's original ideas. Mead taught with Dewey at the University of Michigan from 1891-1894, and when Dewey was appointed president of the University of Chicago in 1894, he requested that Mead be given a professorship.
The other generalised
Mead's legacy is more closely linked to sociology, in particular, his work revolves around how he exercises the self in social interaction. An individual becomes an object to himself or herself through «taking on the role of the other», that is, by taking on the attitudes of others within a social context, what Mead calls «the generalised other”.
We are aware of ourselves, of what the situation is, but exactly how we will act is never experienced until the action takes place. Mead describes the “generalised other» as a form of censor, a mechanism of social control, defining what behaviour is possible or appropriate. However, when we behave impulsively, we are escaping this “social self”. As individuals, we constantly react to the social attitudes of the group and therefore adjust our behaviour. Without this «social self» there would be nothing new in experience.
Mead also emphasised the contextual character of the self. We are not always the same, we are different things to different people, and in every environment we have different «elementals» that we bring out in different social groups. The self begins to develop when we as individuals interact with each other and play different roles. Role-playing also involves becoming aware of the attitudes or perspectives of others.
Nobody is stupid all the time, but we are all stupid sometimes
However, when we act in a habitual way, we are generally not self-aware. We are too often engaged in action at a non-reflective level. Perhaps that is why it makes more sense to narrow down contexts rather than people when we design tools for them.
Emotions and physical objects
In the same way that we relate to people, Mead argued that we relate socially to physical objects, which play a central role in the construction of our identity. Our interactions with physical objects are social, but sometimes they are also embodied.
Therefore designed objects are an essential part of the construction of our identity. One only has to observe the almost intimate relationship we have with some objects, as for some people there are devices that define their social relations and personality. An individual devoid of fetishes does not arouse interest.
Summary and conclusions on pragmatism
In this short series of articles, we have tried to give an overview of the main ideas of the movement and the implications they may have for design practice.
For Peirce, pragmatism was a matter of logic. He developed a strictly logical method for understanding the meaning of scientific concepts. For James, the pragmatic method served to resolve metaphysical disputes by basing them on psychological principles of experience. Dewey and Mead put these principles into practice, with a social and pedagogical component.
Their contributions are best understood as complementary efforts in the quest to develop a philosophy of meaning and research.
All focused on the dynamism of experience and our inability to pinpoint any absolute certainty, since all we really know is that we are part of a world in constant growth and transformation. This view also implies that we are active agents; as we shape the environment, it shapes us. This process of mutual adaptation, where we all have the capacity to bring about change, also leads to the emphasis on creative action for which pragmatism is perhaps best known. Needless to say, these ideas taken out of context could make very frivolous and naïve reading, being fodder for self-help books. There is a popularised and simplified version of what pragmatism means.
During the first decades of the twentieth century, pragmatism was the main philosophical current in the United States, but after Dewey's death in 1952 pragmatism lost much of its momentum. While there were some local communities in Europe where they engaged strongly with American pragmatists during his time, it was in Scandinavia that the movement had the most impact, notably in Sweden, where Dewey's philosophy of education took root. IKEA did not appear there by chance.
It is easy to see analogies between the principles of pragmatic research and design practice:
The focus on experimentation continues throughout the research process, interacting with sketches and prototypes to «express» and clarify ideas. Experience as a starting point for enquiry, where we use our emotions and bodily reactions as «sounding boards», empathising and immersing ourselves in the attitudes (or experiences) of others, to decide how to progress. All of this is enhanced by an overriding belief in human creativity.
In short, a little more pragmatism, properly interpreted, would do the world no harm.
Continue reading
This post is the last in a series of four on Pragmatism and Design:
- Charles Sanders Pierce (I)
Practical consequences, abduction and semiotics. - William James (II)
Mediation, body and emotions. - John Dewey (III)
Learning, experience and closure. - George Herbert Mead (IV)
Identity, social relations and objects.
Bibliography
Aboulafia, M., «George Herbert Mead«, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2020 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)
Brag M. Pragmatism. In Our Time. BBC Radio 4.
Crossman, A. «Biography of Sociologist George Herbert Mead.»ThoughtCo, Jan. 29, 2020
Dalsgaard, P. (2014). “Pragmatism and design thinking”. International Journal of Design, 8(1), 143-155.
Rylander A. «Pragmatism and Design Research». Ingår i Designfakultetens serie kunskapssammanställningar, utgiven i april 2012.