Waving back to someone who turned out to be waving at a person behind you. A missed greeting. Come across your boss when going out. Sit in the wrong place at the meeting table. All awkward. Teenagers call the floor (or the relative cringe) Every once. The emotion is of all times, but the English -language label for discomfort has only made a rise in the popular (online) culture in the last twenty years. In addition to many memes about awkwardness on the internet, there is plenty of attention for television with the label Cringe Comedy: sitcoms like The Office,, ” Fleagag and Curb Your Enthusiasm Who generate the smile through failed social interaction.
Their book is for Pauwke Berkers and Yosha Wijngaarden A Sociology of Awkwardness: On Social Interactions Going Wrongalthough it is an academic, sociological edition, a side street. Wijngaarden is an assistant professor Media & Creative IndustriesBerkers is a professor of sociology of popular music, both at Erasmus University. “It is not music or creative industry, but it is important cultural sociologically,” said Wijngaarden. The interview takes place in the Berkers office on the Rotterdam campus. Wijngaarden continues: “It is an interesting phenomenon that little had been done with. As far as I am concerned, it is also a statement to deviate from running to the next subsidy or important publication within our own niche. We both became enthusiastic about this.”
In their book, Berkers and Wijngaarden work with a definition that reads, translated from English: “feelings of awkwardness are the outcome of social interactions that go wrong, and as such are noticed by at least one of the social actors who are directly involved.” Even when they talk about the subject in Dutch, the researchers opt for the English term. “Awkwardness is a label that has a connotation in popular culture,” said Yosha Wijngaarden. “You don’t hear teenagers calling:” Uncomfortable! ” The Awkward label tells something about a global pop culture that has become increasingly dominant. ”
The interpretation of a situation by pasting a label is interesting for sociologists, Berkers emphasizes. “In the case of awkwardness there is an uncertainty in a situation, then it becomes uncomfortable and the self -consciousness follows. A good example is the greetings in the coronation time. We did not know what to do, uncomfortably bumped into each other with an elbow and thought much more than shaking hands.”
The lack of scientific literature on the subject was an extra incentive for the researchers to write the book. They rely on earlier research into similar emotions, some existing articles and their own empirical research. Although the book appears just before they are ready Awkwardness: A Theory from the American philosopher Alexandra Plakias. Wijngaarden: “I wonder if it is a theory. They are more kind of considerations. She doesn’t think Awkwardness is emotion either.” Berkers: „Daar zijn we het na ons onderzoek pertinent mee oneens. Daarnaast ontstaat awkwardness volgens haar uit een afwijking van het script. Dat beamen we, je hebt mensen die het script niet kennen of zich er niet aan houden, maar er is meer. Je hebt ook interacties waar geen script is, zoals tijdens corona, of de derde optie dat je het script wel kent maar faalt in de uitvoering. Denk aan het geven van een hand en dat het een slap handje is.
The Dutch research also distinguishes itself by an added empirical part. Wijngaarden and Berkers analyzed more than 23,000 tweets and fifty media reports that appeared on awkwardness during the Coronapandemie. They also interviewed ten international students in the Netherlands on the subject. What they see as an awkward, how they feel and, as one of the interviewees notes, that the feeling also applies to spectators, for example when you watch how someone stumbles and falls with a plate full of food.
Awkwardness in places where office space is shared was investigated through observations at eight of those places and interviews with 64 users of those offices, between the early 20 and mid -60s. To find out more about awkwardness in dating, fifteen millennials were interviewed, using the Bumble Bizz app. To find out how awkwardness is framed, eight self -help videos on YouTube have been analyzed that claim to be able to do something about Awkwardness feelings.
Among the examples of awkwardness that respondents gave, was a date, in which a friend of the man came to ask for a fire on the date and then stayed with it because he did not believe that his friend was really on a date. In addition, an international student at the Awkard indicated that he would meet German and Dutch students at parties, and that they did not greet back on the campus the next day. More than collecting anecdotes, it was the researchers to define the phenomenon.
How do you know that awkwardness is only twenty years old as a cultural phenomenon?
Wijngaarden: “You can see that very well in, for example, Google Ngram Viewer in which you can search how often words are used: around the year 2000 the use of the term ‘awkwardness’ in books starts suddenly strongly increased. With the rise of the internet you can see the meme arise with, for example, the Socially awkward Penguin and awkward family photos Where uncomfortable photos and situations are shared. “
According to the hypothesis of berkers and vineyards, the popularity of the AWKWardness label has risen because previously separate population groups are now interact more with each other. Digital Natives work with people who grew up without internet, but also social mobility, migration, internationalization and changing gender roles have led to more diverse social interactions. Think of expats and international students who have to deal with the uncomfortable Dutch circle birthday. A British expat has on the site Accidentaly Dutch Even the step -by -step plan ‘How to survive a Dutch Birthday’ written.
The rise of awkwardness shows the influence of popular culture on our emotional household
But for 2000 people also came in uncomfortable situations?
Wijngaarden: “Of course. We regularly quote the work of the sociologist in the book Goffman Investement Who wrote about interactions in the sixties. He mentions situations that we would now call Awkard, but that he still grabbed under embarrassment (embarrassment). In our theoretical chapter we define the differences between awkwardness and the more investigated emotions embarassment and shallion (shame).”
Berkers: “The rise of awkwardness shows the influence of popular culture on our emotional household. Existing feelings become emotions because they get a label.”
How do you define awkwardness?
Berkers: “We have added a temporal and spatial component in our research. To give an example of the spatial component: I was recently sitting at the hairdresser, my hair was washed there, I was so fucked there and I was greeted by a student who also turned out to be in that case. In a lecture hall that was not awkward, in this space, in this room.” ””
Other examples of spaces that Awkwardness can call are meetings in a lift, mixing home location and work in online meetings, and accidentally entering the wrong space where others are present.
Examples of the component time in uncomfortable situations are, according to the data from the investigation somewhere too early, keeping a door open too long for another or wrong timing in a conversation, creating uncomfortable silences. According to the researchers, it is also possible to anticipate awkwardness. With a first date, meeting in -laws for the first time or a first working day. This anticipatory awkwardness mainly concerns offline interactions. This phenomenon can cause telephone anxiety if it is foreseen that a conversation may go smoothly, and several women interviewed indicated that they are looking up to uncomfortable conversations during dates.
From the interviews you did, you were told that avoidance is not a good strategy at Awkwardness.
Berkers: “Make nothing more of you after a date, what they call ghosts, can be very annoying in the long term if you come across that person. So it is better to close it neatly, according to our respondents.”
Wijngaarden: “But that can also be a socially desirable answer.”
Berkers: “Yes, because it can be awkward to address awkwardness.”
In the introduction you already write that the word awkward is fully used by teenagers. Why are teenagers so busy with it and why do they even find their parents Awkard?
Wijngaarden: “That has to do with a changing role. When you get older then you might be more discussing with adults, but then you should hear family members say things you find awkward. Your parents also appear to have several roles, they are not only your parents but also each other’s loved ones. That’s why teenagers find kissing parents so uncomfortable.”
Why is Awkwardness only being investigated well?
Wijngaarden: “In recent decades have been the major themes of sociology integration, digitization, populism and polarization. With that, AWKWardness is apparently a somewhat more frivolous subject. On the other hand, this subject is in line with the classical sociology of 175 years ago that rotated for changing interactions and changing societies.”
What does society get up with research into this frivolous subject?
Berkers: “In any case, we have shown that awkwardness is not an individual shortcoming, but an inherent consequence of a changing society. Our behavior and our conventions are a social construction. That can reassure people who doubt whether they are Awkward themselves.”
Wijngaarden: “What sociologists have always been doing is to question conventions, asking society, questioning culture, questioning identity and this book is an example of this.”
Berkers: “A sociological examination of awkwardness shows that people are going to act according to the meaning they give to a situation. That is Thomas theorema in sociology: If people define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. If a situation such as Awkward is framed, it has consequences for how they look back at it and how they deal with similar situations in the future. ”
Don’t young people call too fast that something is uncomfortable? You can also say that life is sometimes uncomfortable and that you just have to learn to deal with it.
Berkers: “I find it difficult to determine for someone else what the person can find. It is complicated as uncomfortable and unsafe interchangeably. It seems good that unsafe situations are being raised. But where are the boundaries between open debate, discomfort and insecurity? It is also not to the dominant group of white, highly skilled people.”
Wijngaarden: “Awkward situations can teach us where there is room for growth or space for intervention, when the use of scripts is excluded people. At the same time, if nothing is allowed to be Awkward, if nothing is allowed to sand a little more, it will be very difficult to continue to grow as a society. Then you do not get inevitable.”