Mass observation

Mass observation

Our own interest has been in the more elusive outpourings of sentiments and shifts in public mood. Events of this sort are neither as circumscribed nor as closely tied to routines as the recurrent and repeatable incidents that have been the subject of multiple observation. Usually they follow a build-up in which the mass media have come to play an increasingly important role. Because of its greater flexibility, mass observation is the more suitable technique for collecting fugitive data that are likely to be lost irretrievably unless recorded as things happen. When it comes to riots, acts of insurgency, hostile outbursts, collective expressions of euphoria, devotion, or fear, social scientists all too often are forced to rely on press accounts and such official sources as the police or a government inquiry supplemented by such eye-witness accounts as one is able to dredge up afterwards. How much better to have reports from trained observers at the scene, who are free to roam, to vary their mode of observation, to track down whatever leads they find, and generally to use their ingenuity though guided by some prior notion of what is relevant to the study objective. Each works much as an ethnographer would, playing a dual role as “outside” observer and as participant in the event.

Unlike the ethnographer in the field, observers of the urban scene will often, by the nature of the situation, be moving among complete strangers. Their identity remains unknown, forcing observers to fall back on appearances just as most of us do in everyday life. Erving Goffman (1959:3) formulated the general paradox as follows: “The more the individual is concerned with reality that is not available to perception, the more he must concentrate his attention on appearances.” The statement is an implicit guide to what an observer should enumerate.

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The first and most obvious among these enumerations are visual cues as to the identity of participants. An on-the-spot survey might

be too distracting. But estimates of age, sex, and racial compositions can be made at a glance. They are gross but nevertheless useful indicators, especially when supplemented by further clues about identities from the badges and uniforms people wear; still more subtle indicators can be found in the manner of dress and how people generally comport themselves. Appearances can also reveal how people come to be where they are, but obviously do not suffice insofar as in the urban setting the “appearential” order has been partly replaced by spatially segregated activity (Lofland, 1973).

Additionally, one can look at patterns of traffic to understand where participants come from. During our observational study of the religious crusade Billy Graham conducted in New York (Lang and Lang, 1960), our observers systematically surveyed the number of chartered buses and their places of origin, which media reports of the crusade usually overlooked. In another study (Lang and Lang, 1953), we were greatly helped by the statistics of the Chicago transport authorities and commuter lines, which bolstered our confidence in the generalizations based on direct observation of the throngs that lined the streets of Chicago on the day of General Douglas MacArthur’s triumphal return to receive his hero’s welcome in what was then America’s second city. Our statistics were a corrective to the live coverage and the blown-up media reports of the welcoming crowds.

A second and altogether different kind of “appearance” are the chance remarks and conversations reaching the ears of observers. Revealing of the prevailing climate as such “overheards” often are, one can hardly accept them as representative of everyone’s view. Much is therefore to be gained by an observer who takes a more active role by engaging others in conversation or, occasionally, by interviewing them openly. The latter method was used with some success in studies of participants in several political demonstrations— such as the 1965 civil rights demonstration along US Route 40, the interstate highway that led into Washington (Pinard et al., 1969); the Vietnam Day march in London in 1969 (Barker et al., 1969); and the Washington March for Victory (Lin, 1974; see also Hadden and Rymph, 1966). Unfortunately, these interviews did no more than probe backgrounds and motivations; they failed to take full advantage of the observers’ presence at the scene.

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Observers who are focused on head counts and on other things demanded of them, may be too busy to note less tangible cues about shifts in mood or the signs and symbols that force themselves into the focus of attention. They are unlikely to involve themselves sufficiently to adopt the perspective of other participants necessary for the kind of “thick description” advocated by Clifford Geertz (1973).

This is one reason for instructing observers to include in their record what they themselves are experiencing. We try to control for subjectivity by two procedures: observers are requested to keep this information separate from their descriptions of the behavior of others; they are also given pre-observation questionnaires that ask about what they themselves expect and for what they prepare themselves. With these two sets of information, we can look upon our observers as respondents. Their accounts help to illuminate from “within” what others have merely viewed from the outside.

Finally, we acknowledge that the study of an event by mass observation remains incomplete unless placed in a more general symbolic (political or religious) context. Public pageantry, insignia, leaflets, or any activity in support of a particular image is yet another field on which observations must focus. Equally relevant are the surrounding commercial activity and the visible presence of police, ushers, ambulances, and other social control agents. Together, with assistance from the press, they set the stage. The public recognition granted by the news media can make a national spectacle out of a purely local event.

The news media have a key role in shaping our ideas of the world. They tell us not only what is important, but they also shape our expectations of things to come and disseminate an image of what the public mood is (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). Press statements concerning an impending event exemplify press intervention. Other relevant media content are media portrayals of tension and tranquillity, of public euphoria and dismay, of heroes and villains and the degree to which they, and the groups they may represent, are consistently cast into unambiguously positive (or negative) stereotypes or depicted in a more or less balanced manner (see, for example, Turner and Surace, 1956).

So ubiquitous have the media indeed become that sometimes they steal the show. To cite just one example, during the Paris student disorders in May 1968, radio reporters with open microphones were instrumental in bringing a student leader into negotiations with the

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French minister of education. Later the rejection by the student leader of a proposal to end the strike was heard live by a national television audience, later becoming part of the lore of 1968 (for a good English summary of these incidents, see Singer, 1970). Since then, audiences all over the world have been witness to revolutionary events played out live on television, often with that larger audience in mind. In 1989 English-language banners were carried by Chinese students in Tiananmen Square and in several demonstrations in eastern Europe.

The possibility of such interplays between on-the-scene and media activity force mass observers to be on the lookout for any presumably spontaneous activity generated by, or staged for, the benefit of the television camera as well as for evidence of feedback. To cite another French example: in 1961 draftees among the troops in Algiers defied orders to launch a revolt after appeals of the civil government and estimates of the situation by journalists reached them via the transistor radios many of them had (Ambler, 1966; Kelly, 1965). And in postwar Germany, media recognition of their “heroic struggle” during the Berlin blockade of 1948–9 was a real morale booster which made the inhabitants of that besieged city more determined to hold out in the face of Soviet threats to close out this outpost of the West completely isolated within Soviet-controlled territory (Davison, 1956).