Herbert George Blumer (March 7, 1900 – April 13, 1987) was an American sociologist whose main scholarly interests were symbolic interactionism and methods of social research. Believing that individuals create social reality through collective and individual action, he was an avid interpreter and proponent of George Herbert Mead's social psychology, which he labeled symbolic interactionism. Blumer elaborated and developed this line of thought in a series of articles, many of which were brought together in the book Symbolic Interactionism. An ongoing theme throughout his work, he argued that the creation of social reality is a continuous process. Blumer was also a vociferous critic of positivistic methodological ideas in sociology.
Life Blumer was born March 7, 1900, in St. Louis, Missouri. He grew up in Webster Groves, Missouri, with his parents. He moved to Webster Groves with his family in 1905 onto a farm, but his father commuted to St. Louis every day to run a cabinet-making business. Blumer attended Webster Groves High School and later the University of Missouri from 1918 to 1922. Herbert Blumer was constantly being grounded in the world of economics and labor, insofar as having to drop out of high school to help his father's woodworking shop which was recovering from a fire. Moreover, during the summer, Blumer worked as a copy typist to pay for his college education. While studying undergraduate at the University of Missouri, Blumer was fortunate enough to work with Charles Ellwood, a sociologist, and Max Meyer, a psychologist. Ellwood was a University of Chicago alumnus (PhD 1899) who advised Blumer on his academic future.
Upon his graduation in 1921 with a bachelor's degree and in 1922 with a master's degree (both from the University of Missouri), Blumer secured a teaching position at the University of Missouri. Then, in 1925, he relocated to the University of Chicago, a university where he was greatly influenced by the social psychologist George Herbert Mead and sociologists W. I. Thomas and Robert Park. See also, Tsukasa Kuwabara et al., 2026, Herbert Blumer and the Chicago Tradition, Journal of Economics and Sociology, Kagoshima University, 106: 75-83. Upon completing his doctorate in 1928, he accepted a teaching position at the University of Chicago, where he continued his own research under Mead and became captivated with the prospects of examining the interactions between humans and the world. Blumer taught at this institution from 1927 to 1952.Mann, Douglass. Understanding Society: A Survey of Modern Social Theory. Oxford University Press. 2008
Blumer was the secretary treasurer of the American Sociological Association from 1930 to 1935 and was the editor of the American Journal of Sociology from 1941 to 1952. In 1952, he moved from the University of Chicago and presided and developed the newly formed Sociology Department at the University of California, Berkeley. During World War II, he had a role as an arbitrator for the national steel industry, eventually becoming the chairman of the board of arbitration from 1945 until 1947. Blumer was appointed the first chair of the Department of Sociology at the University of California at Berkeley, a post he held until he retired in 1967. After his death, he was credited with establishing the reputation of the University of California at Berkeley Sociology Department by the 1960s. In 1952, he became the president of the American Sociological Association and he received the association's award for a Career of Distinguished Scholarship in 1983. Blumer served as the 46th president of the American Sociological Association and his Presidential Address was his paper "Sociological Analysis and the 'Variable'". Blumer was also elected as the president of the Society for the Study of Social Problems in 1954 and of the Pacific Sociological Society in 1971. He was said to be "the only white man whom Malcolm X trusted". With Emeritus Professor status until 1986, Blumer continued to be actively engaged in writing and research until shortly before his death on April 13, 1987.
Professional football career
During much of the period that Blumer was at the University of Chicago from, 1925 through 1933, including all of the years that he was completing his doctorate,Cf. Herbert Blumer, 1928, Method in Social Psychology, Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Chicago. Blumer played football professionally for the Chicago Cardinals, now known as the Arizona Cardinals, a team in the National Football League. He had two career touchdowns both in the 1925 season. The first was in the 4th quarter of a game against the Milwaukee Badgers with a distance of under 3 yards. The second was in the second quarter of another game with against the Badgers which was 30+ yards in distance. Both touchdowns were via the quarterback, Red Dunn. Blumer played as an end, guard, and a series of other positions. He had 4 jersey numbers over the course of his career, numbers 8, 20, 17,15. During his first year of his doctorate, he also scored two touchdowns for the Cardinals. During that season, the Cardinals won the league championship, although that victory remains controversial due to the disqualification of the Pottsville Maroons, a team with a better record. Blumer was selected to the 1929 All-Pro Team. Blumer played 59 games over the course of his career and retired in 1933.
Offices held Source:
Chairman of the Board of Arbitration for the United States Steel Corporation and the United Steel Workers of America (1945–1947) Chief Liaison Officer of the Office of War Information in the State Department (during WWII) Head of the Department of Sociology and Social Institutions at the University of California, Berkeley (1952) President of the Society for the Study of Social Problems (1954) 46th ASA/American Sociological Association) President Pacific Sociological Society (1971) Chairman of the board of directors of Transaction
Awards
Award for a Career of Distinguished Scholarship (1983) Berkeley Citation (1984)
Intellectual contributions Symbolic interactionism Although Blumer devised the term symbolic interaction in 1937, the early development of this theoretical approach to social analysis is largely credited to the work of George Herbert Mead during his time at the University of Chicago. Blumer played a key role in keeping the tradition of symbolic interactionism alive by incorporating it into his teachings at the university.Ritzer, George. Sociological Theory. McGraw-Hill. 2011. He presented his articles on symbolic interactionism in a single volume in which he conceptualized symbolic interaction into three main points: Humans act towards things (including other individuals) on the basis of the meanings they have for them. There is a particular emphasis on the consciousness of actors as they interpret their actions. It is important to recognize that the meaning or value of an object to one person may differ with another person- sociologists should not reduce human action to social rules and norms. Blumer stresses this point because of the fear that our subjective meaning of our actions could be overshadowed by the norms and rules of society The meaning of things arises out of the social interactions one has with one's fellows. The meaning of something is a social product, therefore it is not inherent in things. Meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretive process a person uses in dealing with the things he or she encounters. Meanings are seen as a series of interpretive actions by the actor. The actor gives objects meanings, act accordingly based on these meanings, and then revises the meanings to guide his future action. The actor has an internal conversation with himself to determine the meanings, especially when encountering something out of the ordinary.
Blumer believed that what creates society itself is people engaging in social interaction. It follows then that social reality only exists in the context of the human experience. His theory of symbolic interaction, some argue, is thus closer to a theoretical framework (based on the significance of meanings and the interaction between individuals) than an applicable theory.
According to Blumer's theory, interaction between individuals is based on autonomous action, which in turn is based on the subjective meaning actors attribute to social objects and/or symbols. Thus individual actors regulate their behavior based on the meaning they attribute to objects and symbols in their relevant situation. Blumer theorized that assigning objects meaning is an ongoing, two-fold process. First, is the identification of the objects that have situational meaning. Second, is the process of internal communication to decide which meaningful object to respond to. Acknowledging that others are equally autonomous, individuals use their subjectively derived interpretations of others (as social objects) to predict the outcome of certain behaviors, and use such predictive insight to make decisions about their own behavior in the hopes of reaching their goal. Thus, when there is consensus among individual actors about the meaning of the objects that make up their situation, social coordination ensues. Social structures are determined as much by the action of individual actors as they determine the action of those individuals. Based on this, Blumer believed that society exists only as a set of potentials, or ideas that people could possibly use in the future.Allan, Kenneth. Explorations in Classical Sociological Theory: Seeing the Social World. Pine Forge Press. 2005
This complex interaction between meanings, objects, and behaviors, Blumer reiterated, is a uniquely human process because it requires behavioral responses based on the interpretation of symbols, rather than behavioral responses based on environmental stimuli. As social life is a "fluid and negotiated process," to understand each other, humans must intrinsically engage in symbolic interaction. Blumer criticized the contemporary social science of his day because instead of using symbolic interactionism they made false conclusions about humans by reducing human decisions to social pressures like social positions and roles. Blumer was more invested in psychical interactionism that holds that the meanings of symbols are not universal, but are rather subjective and are "attached" to the symbols and the receiver depending on how they choose to interpret them.
Blumer's 3 types of objects The importance of thinking to symbolic interactionists is shown through their views on objects. Blumer defined objects as the things "out there" in the world. The significance of objects is how they are defined by the actor. In other words, different objects have different meanings depending on the individual. Physical (a chair, a tree) Social (student, mother, friend) Abstract (ideas or moral principals)
Summary principles of symbolic interactionism Human beings are capable of thought. This capacity for thought is shaped by social interaction. We learn the meanings and the symbols through social interaction, exercising the human capacity for thought. These meanings and symbols provide the basis for distinctive human action and interaction. Modification of meanings and symbols occur through the interpretation of situations. Humans' capability of modification is due to their ability to interact with themselves. The intertwining of interaction and action make up groups and societies.
Methodological contributions to sociology