A stranger claiming local host status can dissolve a woman’s normal reserve toward men

Evidence

A young woman is seated in the very last seat of a bus; the seat extends the entire width of the bus. She has been on the bus since it started out from the depot and took the seat she now occupies at the time she boarded. After the bus has been traveling for some five minutes, it stops at an intersection and a working class middle-aged male comes aboard. After paying the driver, he moves toward the rear, and as he is about to reach the back seat, he looks at the woman seated there and says, “This is my favorite place. Will I be in the way?” The woman smiles and replies that of course he will not. He seats himself on the same seat but somewhat to the left of her, next to the window. During the next twenty or thirty minutes they engage in on again, off again conversation. Finally, they begin to talk and do not interrupt their conversation until the male leaves the bus. — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 1006

Categorization

• XREF: Directly instantiates the reader’s stated purpose: urban strangers in public space. The claim to a locale recasts civil inattention — the woman drops her aloofness because the man frames himself as host.
• ADDENDUM: Connects to ‘Complaints About Immodesty Go Way Back’ via how public-space claims of authority reshape who may approach whom.
• DEFINE: Concrete illustration of ‘appropriateness’ as the third axis of encounter assessment alongside desirability and legitimacy.