In the 2nd unit of Sociology, Grade 10 students have been
studying the concept of dramaturgy that was developed by a Sociologist
named Erving Goffman in 1959. Goffman’s idea was that life is like a
never-ending play in which people are actors. When we are born, we are thrust
onto a stage called everyday life, and our socialization consists of learning
how to play our assigned roles from other people. He believed that whatever we
do, we are playing out some role on the stage of life.
To gain a deeper understanding of this concept, Grade 10 and
12 A2 students did experiential learning by watching a drama performance titled,
'Inspektur Jendral' by Teater Koma in Gedung Kesenian Jakarta.
Ms. Elvira Damayanti introduced us to two Maestros, Mr. Nano Riantiarno and
Mrs. Ratna Riantiarno, who built Teater Koma,
the most famous performing arts group in Indonesia. We were extremely lucky to
have a chance to meet them and interview them about the group and their
repertoire. We even had a special opportunity to walk around observing
backstage before the play.
Mr. Nano and Mrs. Ratna Riantiarno told us that the ‘Inspektur Jendral’ is the 142nd
production. Teater Koma was found on March 1, 1977 in Jakarta. As a drama
group, Teater Koma has a good reputation in Indonesia. They often perform in
the Jakarta Arts Center, Taman Ismail Marzuki, TVRI, Jakarta Arts Building
(Gedung Kesenian Jakarta) and also in other cities outside Jakarta. Currently
the group is supported by 30 active members and 50 members. Mr. Nano Riantiarno
is the central figure whose role is not only as leader, but also as a director
and screenwriter. His wife, Mrs. Ratna, is an actress and the prima-donna of
the group and also acts as the performing arts manager.
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| In the backstage while they were doing the make up |
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| The performers were practicing on the stage before the show |
An hour before the play started, we were able to go
backstage and see the players putting on their makeup and costumes. When we
talked to the backstage crew, they said that they started the makeup and hair 6
hours before the play. The most interesting part in observing backstage was
that the students found out that none of the players were seen reading the
script. We saw some of them practicing, some of them preparing the music, and
some of them hanging around, eating, talking and relaxing with the others. It
seemed that they already memorized the script and were confident enough with
their capability to perform.
The play was opened by the big sound of a gong then the play
began. Inspektur Jendral is a play originally made by Nikolai Gogol in the 19th
century that was adopted into Bahasa Indonesia by Teater Koma with using the
concept of wayang. The play takes place in a remote town called Ananta Bura,
Astina, ruled by a corrupt government, when a message is abruptly delivered
from the capital that says an Inspector General will be visiting and inspecting
the town incognito. The play is largely a political satire of the government
and though it was written in the 19th century, it proves to still be relevant
in today’s world.
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| The show |
That day, the students went home with a new experience, not
only watching a drama performance in a real art building, but also experiencing
the ambience of high culture.
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Mr. Nano and Mrs. Ratna Riantiarno took a photo with us in the backstage |
After the excursion, the students need to make a report. Below are some example of their work
Dramaturgy Analysis based on the drama play Inspektur Jendral by Teater Koma - Christina Stephanie
A man named Erving Goffman once develop the concept that ‘life is like a never ending
play’ in which the actors are everyday people. He believed that whatever we do, we are
playing out some role on the stage of life. I mpression management is a goal-directed
conscious or unconscious process in which people attempt to influence the perceptions of
other people about a person, object or event; they do so by regulating and controlling
information in social interaction. With dramaturgy, people give the impression of a certain
character they “play” to impose the meaning of who or what they are.
According to Goffman, we use these 3 mechanics in which he calls ‘s ign vehicles’ to
present ourselves to others ; social setting, appearance, and manners of interacting. T he
social setting is the physical place where interaction occurs. It could be a doctor’s
examination room, a hallway, someone’s home, or a professor’s office. How we arrange our
spaces, and what we put in them, conveys a lot of information about us. Appearance also
speaks volumes about us - race, clothing, physical stature, stereotypes. O ur manner of
interacting consists of the attitudes we convey in an attempt to get others to form certain
impressions about us. One of the most common ways to convey attitudes is through
nonverbal communication, the ways we have of communicating that do not use spoken
words. In which this includes gestures, facial expressions and body language.
The play that we watched, ‘Inspektur Jendral’ applied IM in the front stage as an
example:
1. The character ‘Inspektur Jendral’ (at least from who they thought was him) use the
method in appearance, and manners of interacting as a strategy to impose that he
is ‘Inspektur Jendral’ - Wearing fancy clothes, speaking and behaving like a person
from ‘Ibukota’ (with class, courtesy) as he successfully impose the meaning as one.
2. With the strategy of manners of interacting and appearance, 5 colorful women
(Canguk, Limbik, Plitit, Srikayon, Bunguk) became a main attention to the
audience as they demonstrated the characters of ‘rebels’ or ‘protesters’ - colorful
abstract cosmetics, clothing and the behaviour of one who’s dictating and wants to
have a say in how things run.
3. As well as the other 4 characters who play as ministers, impose the meaning of
their ‘power’ to the lower level characters like merchants and sellers, and their
ability to manipulate the system. The fancy white clothing and the behavior of a
snob.
Impression management works as they showcase and makes it easier for the audience
to reckon out and guess what each character is. Simply, what I notice actually is that
characters who stand in higher social standing have shinier clothes compare to characters
to just play as sellers or merchants. Impression management for me is acting itself, the
costumes, the tone of speaking, the gestures. I have to say, even the audience were
successfully manipulated to the thought Anta Hinimba is ‘Inspektur Jendral’. The acting
worked, front stage worked, and this showcase as well that everyone can be the victim of
dramaturgy and impression management.
We had the opportunity to go backstage before the show started, so I was able to meet a
couple of characters in their costume already, and even took pictures with the character
‘Yogi’ (who was said to be a servant). Although it was clear how they looked like - their
appearance, I couldn’t really recall what character they play. This proves that Impression
Management isn’t easily successful if only one strategy is shown, and that manners of
interacting, personal space and social setting plays a huge role to impose meanings of one.
In this case, costumes and appearance isn’t enough to impose that the character ‘Yogi’ I met
is a servant. However, after watching the play, listening to his story, how he acts does
impose that he is a servant.
Learning this topic, has taught me to“Choose your self-presentation very carefully, for
what starts out as a mask may become your face” - Erving Goffman also warned about his
concept of situated identities, the self that can be identified with the role one is currently
playing. They define us in reference to the role we are playing at a given time. And that the
character we are playing could posses us and end up being who we are.
From the play we watched, they were actually trying display the real life incident of
KPK and corruption in which we can relate on. With how even the ‘poor’ characters bribe
the rich-high social standing characters, and even then the rich-high social standing
characters bribe richer-higher social standing characters. There was no exact solution told
in the play, however if we observe further this stands a question for us, whether we are
going to continue like this, with corrupting and deceive. That we will easily be fooled of who
actually runs the control of our government system? The solution of this is for us to stop
being careless and foolish, and stick with the right morals. That bribing doesn’t actually
work and people who have power tends to take advantage of it.
reference:
SparkNotes. Retrieved November 10, 2015, from
http://www.sparknotes.com/sociology/identity-and-reality/section2.rhtml
Drama Analysis
Maria Regine Levanty A.S
10 Centaurus
Impression Management is the effort to influence other’s perspective of something or someone. This theory explains that we try to make a perception consistent with our goals by regulating and controlling information during social interaction. The most common type of impression management is self-presentation and presentation of merchandise.
‘Inspektur Jendral’ by Teater Koma actually use this theory in many ways possible, for example in how they perform, the actors are doing their characters and they have to make audiences’ perception towards their characters is consistent with what they want it to be, or how it should be. For example, there is this one character called Anta Hinimba and the real actor is Rangga Riantiarno, his goal is to perform as another person and influence audiences’ perspective of his character by acting, by doing things that is representing its (the character) characteristics hence achieving his goal. The rest of the actors also do it, obviously, because that’s the goal of a drama, to become someone else and to convince audience about a character.
‘Inspektur Jendral’ also applies impression management during many scenes, such as when the officials using ingratiation; one of impression management strategies; or to be precise, they emphasize their own positive attributes to the fake “inspector general” so he would like them. But, the officials aren’t the only one that uses ingratiation; Mayor Ananta Bura uses it also; even so, they (officials and mayor) using different techniques of ingratiation. The officials are using self-presentation ingratiation, which is to promoting themselves. The mayor is using other enhancement ingratiation and also favor-doing ingratiation; other enhancement ingratiation is when the ingratiator (mayor) compliments the target individual (fake inspector general). In the case of favor-doing ingratiation,
I believe that the mayor has done a pretty good job, even though I still think he is foolish and simpleminded; favor-doing ingratiation is the method of seeming helpful and considerate to the target individual, just like what Mayor did, to gain the inspector general’s good thoughts of him. Then, the intimidation done by mayor towards his folks also shows the application of impression management, he wants the folk of Ananta Bura have this intimidated or even feared feelings towards him, even though he’s just a half-baked leader. The fake inspector general was doing impression management towards people in the town, because he is trying to influence their perspective so they think he is the real inspector general. He has done a great job, I suppose.For me, all the impression management they’ve done was satisfying and acceptable, whatever their goal is, I am sure it has been achieved. They succeed in influencing the audience (me) to build my perspective of someone. For me, the mayor (played by Budi Ros) is; again; foolish and simpleminded person who likes to bribe and flatter someone to get what he want. See? It is what the actor’s goal, to make the audience believe that the mayor IS that kind of person. On the other hand, I believe that the impression management in the play itself can’t really be considered as successful or not, because the play is meant to be like that, it already has the flow. Their impression management successfully influences my feelings towards Anta Hinimba and Mayor Ananta Bura, I take a favor in Anta Hinimba because I like the way he represents himself as ‘inspector general’. His impression management towards the folks in town succeeds and making him a good actor, he’s tricky in case of getting what he wants. Mayor Ananta Bura himself did quite a good job influencing my perspective of him, making me see him as someone loathsome, doing corruption, flattering someone just to get what he wants, and being fooled to boost.
In the back stage before the performance, I could see that everyone is busy preparing the performance; it is their top priority at the moment. Make-ups, dresses, and rehearsals, also briefing can be seen when I see the backstage before the play. I didn’t go to the backstage after performance, but like any other play, we can guess that they will change their dress, have celebration of their success, more or so.
There are some social interactions in the performance, such as the direct social interaction itself (conversation). Then there are letters and gestures being used to interact between people. Actually, in this drama, there is one obvious social problem, which is corruption and fraud. The officials have done the corruption, and also they bribe each other with money. In the performance, it’s not clear that the social problem has been solved or not. But I believe it hasn’t because the show ended with a cliffhanger, they just knew that they have been tricked after doing corruption and fraud. They haven’t been sentenced of that crime.
Resources:
http://study.com/academy/lesson/impression-management-in-sociology-theory-definition-examples.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impression_management#Motives_and_strategies
http://study.com/academy/lesson/erving-goffmans-theories-impression- management-dramaturgy-symbolic-interaction.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingratiation
