City dwellers can assume stranger ratification without a word spoken

Evidence

Sometimes the game is played in a more subtle, a more inward manner. I refer here to the expression of identity that accompanies being present in the appropriate location and I or dressing for the pan. Here the individual makes no verbal claim to the identity in question. Nor does he receive any verbal ratification for it. Instead, his knowledge of urban meanings allows him to assume that if he appears in a cenain place and/ or in a certain way, those about him will make the appropriate “identification” and this “assumed” ratification is sufficient. The shy young man, ill at ease and unsuccessful with women, can, at least for a moment, “be” the swinger of his secret dreams by the simple expedient of standing about in a body bar “looking cool.” — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 969

Categorization

Category: Causal Relationships

• XREF: The ‘assumed ratification’ mechanism parallels Lofland’s own argument that urbanites categorize strangers to navigate space without interpersonal trust — the observer’s fantasy self is confirmed merely by being read correctly.

Related

• Urban dwellers adopt identities through assumed rather than spoken ratification (similarity 0.90)
• Urban life is possible because strangers remain categorically identifiable (similarity 0.86)
• Urban appearance alone can confer identity without any verbal claim (similarity 0.84)
• Pure anonymity is intolerable, so urban dwellers must know their strangers (similarity 0.81)
• City life depends on dependable clues linking appearances to identities (similarity 0.81)
• City dwellers read identities and perform behavior from learned repertoires (similarity 0.81)
• Urbanites symbolically transform public space into private space to reduce stranger contact (similarity 0.80)
• City order makes strangers identifiable enough to be tolerated (similarity 0.80)
• Urban meanings are taught from birth as coded instructions. (similarity 0.79)
• Location is the single best clue for identifying urban strangers. (similarity 0.79)
• Cities mitigate total anonymity through categorical identification of strangers (similarity 0.79)
• Cities historically shifted from appearance-based to location-based stranger identification (similarity 0.79)
• Urban competence rests on reading strangers’ appearances, locations, and behaviors (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• In the anonymous city, wearing high-status dress could grant assumed rights #expands (0.70) — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 1109
• Collective emergencies suspend urban anonymity and legitimize open stranger contact #expands (0.60) — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 998
• Industrial urbanization destroyed appearance as a reliable clue to strangers’ identities #qualifies (0.55) — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 351
• Cities historically shifted from appearance-based to location-based stranger identification #qualifies (0.50) — Lyn H. Lofland, World of Strangers_ Order and Action in…, 11