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A Symbolic Interactionist Analysis of the Montgomery Bus Boycott: Society As a Communicative Process

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A Symbolic Interactionist Analysis of the Montgomery Bus Boycott: Society As a Communicative Process A SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONIST ANALYSIS OF THE MONTGOMERY BUS BOYCOTT: SOCIETY AS A COMMUNICATIVE PROCESS A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfill~ent .•-. .r l,•• J i University c~ ~isc □ nsin DEDICATION T □ Rosa Parks, Fdgar uan1eL Nixon ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thank v □ u t □ my thesi3 advisor and Professor William C. Davidson .c~ inspiration, encouragement and guidance. To mv life's partner. Dennis, I owe much gratitude for oatience and help with word processing. A grateful acknowledgement to Kathy Halsey, head □ f Interlibrary Loan at the University □ f Wisconsin 1 Stevens Point, for assistance in gathering research materials. NAMU AMIDA BUTGL TABLE OF CONTENTS II. MONTGOMERY'S HISTORICAL BACKGROUND: THE PRC-BOYCOTT SETTINB ....................... 32 III. ROSA PARKS' ARREST: THE BOYCOTT BEGINS ............................ Sl AN EXTENDED SYMBOLIC INTERACTION. CONCLUSION OF THE BOYCOTT: A NEW SYMBOLIC E~VIRONMENT ................... 1G2 1 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Protest movements have figured significantly in the American political process including American history's first protest, the Boston Tea Party, which signaled the Colonies' growing demand for independence from Great Britain. That protest movements can alter not only our knowledge and feelings toward a situation, but also our willingness to change the status quo and therefore, perhaps effect a profound change in the way we live is astounding. How is it that a concerted effort by a group or collectivity to demonstrate their grievances can make such a powerful statement as to inculcate a change in the existing social order? What sustains the unity of a minority in the face of a resistant or hostile authority? The Montgomery bus boycott, 1~55-1956, was a protest movement of profound significance not only for black Americans, but also for a well-established way of life in the South and ultimately, for the fulfillment of the promise of democracy--equal rights for all American citizens. The boycott was the first successful direct action campaign of the Civil Rights Movement in the South and it served as an impetus 2 for further efforts toward desegregation. 1 Through their protest activities, a politically powerless minority was able ta effect a substantial change in an established, institutionalized order of life. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the Montgomery bus boycott: the antecedent conditions surrounding the participants, the actualization of the pretest activities, the efforts to sustain unity despite the actions of hostile authorities and the resultant successful litigation. This effort seeks a better understanding of how protest movements are shaped through social interaction and in turn, how movements are involved in the social definition of reality. The study of communication has amplified my vision cf people in society and given me the keys to a framework which would allow such an analysis. As a theory of communication, symbolic interactionism looks at both the individual and society as emergent products of symbolically mediated acts. In symbolic interactionism meanings are central; they are formed through defining activities as people interact and communicate. This transaction involves a formative interpretive process that continually defines reality; that is, reality is socially defined. Our shared perspectives are lBayard Rustin, Strategies for Freedom: The Changing Patterns of Black Protest (New York: Columbia University Pres·s·, 1976), pp.87-38; see al·so James W. Vanderzanden, "The Non-Violent Resistance Movement Against Segregation,'' in Studies in Social Movements: A Social-Psychological Perspective, ed. Barry McLaughlin (New York: The Free Press, 1 "376) , p • 53 • 3 the product of communication, a process that is ongoing and emergent and more importantly, a process that enables coo1-dination of action, what Blumei- te1-ms "joint action. 11 2 The symbolic interactionist perspective stresses the dynamic, problematic character of human society which is in accord with the open-ended, processual nature of communication. For the purposes of this study, the symbolic interactionist perspective's usefulness will be in facilitating an understanding of events leading to the formation of the protest and an understanding of how the movement successfully effected a change in the existing social order. Finally, using this perspective to analyze the boycott will further our understanding of society as a communicative How have symbolic interactionists studied social movements? Herbert Blumer, considered the foremost theoretician of the symbolic interactionist perspective, defines social movements as "collect i \/e ent erp1- i ses to establish a new order of life" and notes, as traditional social movements theorists do, that movements at their inception have a condition of unrest and dissatisfaction with the current form of life. Consequently, with the idea of society as a formative process, Blumer's hypothesis is that the ccu-ee1- of a social movement depict ·s II the emergence of a. _2Herbert Blumer, Symbolic Interaction: Perspective and Method (New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1969b), p.70. ,.., social movements from a temporal, developmental perspective.~ He emphasizes that studies should focus on exploring the mechanisms by which a movement is able to grow and become organized. His theory of a movement's evolution includes agitation, development of ~spirit de corps, development of morale, the formation of an ideology and the development of operating tactics (Blumer 1969a, p.12). Of utmost importance in the symbolic interactionist approach to social movements is the analysis of the process of definition through social interaction because, as Blumer posits, this is what guides behavior. The significance of using this approach in extending our knowledge of communication can be seen in the differences among the other approaches that study social movements. Traditionally, social movements have been viewed as arising out of public discontent with adverse social or economic conditions induced by the structural strain of rapid social change. 4 The view of social movements shifted from that of a response to drastic social change to one of a mechanism 3 Herbert Blumer, "Social Movements," in Studies in Social Movements: A Sociological-Psychological Perspective, ed. Barry McLaughlin (New York: The Free Press, 1969a), pp.8,11. 4 Bradford L. Simcock, "Developmental Aspects of Anti­ Pollution Protest in Japan," Re·sear,=h in Social Movements, Conflicts and Change, Vol. 2, < □ ::-,:ford: JAI Press, 1"379), p.56; see also J. Ci-aig Jenkins, "Resource Mobilization Theory and tl-ie Study ,:::)f Social Movements," Annual Fi'.eview of Sociology, Vol.9, (Palo Altc,: Annual Reviews, 1983), p.52. ·-'c::- through which social change is shaped and directed.5 This new perspective assumed that social movement activities are rational and adaptive responses and that movements are an agency for social change. By emphasizing the continuities between movement and institutionalized actions, social movement analysts argued that the basic goals of movements are defined by conflicts of interest built into institutionalized oowei- relations (Jenkins, p.528). This theoretical model comes closer to the symbolic interactionist perspective in that social movement participants are seen as an integral part of society-undergoing-change. But, critics argued, this interpretation of social movements does not sufficiently explain why organized protest emerges when and where it does. A condition of public discontent that seems ripe for protest does not always lead to a social movement and conversely, there are instances of movements arising in apparent absence of observable public discontent (Simcock, p .83). Studies shifted from what McCarthy and Zald call the classic grievance model to a model focusing on the opportunities for collective action and the mobilization of resources. This mobilization resource approach emphasizes the social distribution of material resources, for example, money, 5Luther Gerlach and Virginia M. Hine, People, Power, Change: Movements of Social Transformation <Indianapolis: Bobb·s-Men-i l l, 1970) , p .:,di i. s time, organizational skills, needed to mount a successful movement (Simcock, p.84). But, as Simcock points out, this resource mobilization perspective taken alone is also an inadequate framework far a comprehensive understanding cf social movements, because ''it fails to present a full and balanced picture of the ways in which resources interact with discontent to produce them'' (Simcock, p.84). What is missing, according to Simcock, is a view of human action based on symbolically mediated thought and interaction (Simcock, p.86). Simcock's point is that all the objective resources and deprivations in the world will not produce a social movement in a setting where the discontented do not see their situation as amenable to change. Simcock's criticism of social movement theory is that it has not looked at the symbolic processes that go on behind, beneath and within frameworks of objective conditions and resources <Simcock, p.86). He calls for an interactionist approach that penetrates the facade of structural explanation with an analysis of the symbolic processes going on between a discontented public and organizations adept at resource mobilization: the interface between ideology and discontent (Simcock, p.87). That Simcock amends the deficiencies of social movement theory with the integration of the symbolic interactionist approach is strong support for the explanatory power of
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