Erving Goffman and “The New Normal”: Havoc and Containment in the Pandemic Era

In this article, we explore two of Goffman’s “minor” categories—havoc and containment-- as the key for organizing/systematizing the more “major” categories—co-presence, the interaction order, presentation of self, the body as sheath, and frame analysis—in order to provide insight into the experience of the Covid-19 epidemic. Goffman offers a set of conceptual tools to understand our historical moment of the worst pandemic since 1918 and its context of social media contention, renewed calls for social justice, and the disruptive performances by President Donald J. Trump. While these “minor” concepts are not widely known except for Goffman scholars, they provide a rich interpretive framework for analyzing social regulation and the management of threats to social order across a wide range of historical contexts. In Goffman's work, these terms are both descriptions of timeless human behaviors and openings into diachronic analysis of changing contexts. We unpack the explanatory power of these concepts in understanding the current moment of the Covid pandemic, as well as its connection to the context of contemporary phenomena such as fake news, internet and social media communication, and the attempt to regulate rioting bodies at the Capitol.