Contesting the Marginal Man Trope: Reflections on Jaworski’s Erving Goffman and the Cold War

Abstract At one point in Gary Jaworski’s important study Erving Goffman and the Cold War he criticizes the “marginal man trope” surrounding Goffman; the notion of him as a scholar unconnected to his time and place. In this review essay I adopt this term more broadly as a means of highlighting the book’s contribution. This can be seen positively in how it draws our attention to the three factors of cold war experience, culture and Goffman’s “natural metaphors.”, providing new ways of viewing Goffman’s sociological project. Further critiques of the marginal man trope could explore how Goffman’s citizenship and ethnicity complicated his place in the Cold War U.S. From here, inspired by the prominence Jaworski has given to Goffman’s Strategic Interaction , I question to what extent the marginal man trope has been encouraged by the canonization of The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life . I conclude by suggesting the ways in which Erving Goffman and the Cold War might offer inspiration to scholars, who, like many in Goffman’s time, today find themselves battling attacks on their institutions and scholarship.