caricatured the lack of etiquette in a group of men who are depicted leering at women and crowding them off the sidewalk.
Sociological perspectives In a society, manners are described as either good manners or as bad manners to indicate whether a person's behaviour is acceptable to the cultural group. As such, manners enable
ultrasociality and are integral to the functioning of the
social norms and
conventions that are informally enforced through self-regulation. The perspectives of sociology indicate that manners are a means for people to display their social status, and a means of demarcating, observing, and maintaining the boundaries of
social identity and of
social class. In
The Civilizing Process (1939), sociologist
Norbert Elias said that manners arose as a product of group living, and persist as a way of maintaining social order. Manners proliferated during the
Renaissance in response to the development of the 'absolute state'—the progression from small-group living to large-group living characterised by the centralized power of the State. The rituals and manners associated with the royal court of England during that period were closely bound to a person's
social status. Manners demonstrate a person's position within a social network, and a person's manners are a means of negotiation from that social position. From the perspective of
public health, in
The Healthy Citizen (1995), Alana R. Petersen and Deborah Lupton said that manners assisted the diminishment of the social boundaries that existed between the
public sphere and the
private sphere of a person's life, and so gave rise to "a highly reflective self, a self who monitors their behavior with due regard for others with whom he or she interacts, socially"; and that "the public behavior of individuals came to signify their social standing; a means of presenting the self and of evaluating others, and thus the control of the outward self was vital." Sociologist
Pierre Bourdieu applied the concept of
habitus to define the societal functions of manners. The
habitus is the set of mental attitudes, personal habits, and skills that a person possesses—their
dispositions of character that are neither self-determined, nor pre-determined by the external environment, but which are produced and reproduced by social interactions—and are "inculcated through experience and explicit teaching", yet tend to function at the
subconscious level. Manners are likely to be a central part of the
dispositions that guide a person's ability to decide upon socially-compliant behaviours.
Anthropologic perspective In
Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (2003) the anthropologist
Mary Douglas said that manners, social behaviors, and group rituals enable the local
cosmology to remain ordered and free from those things that may pollute or defile the integrity of the culture. Ideas of pollution, defilement, and disgust are attached to the margins of socially acceptable behaviour in order to curtail unacceptable behaviour, and so maintain "the assumptions by which experience is controlled" within the culture.
Evolutionary perspectives In studying the expression of emotion by humans and animals, naturalist
Charles Darwin noted the universality of facial expressions of
disgust and
shame among infants and blind people, and concluded that the emotional responses of shame and disgust are innate behaviours. Public health specialist
Valerie Curtis said that the development of facial responses was concomitant with the development of manners, which are behaviours with an
evolutionary role in preventing the
transmission of diseases, thus, people who practise
personal hygiene and
politeness will most benefit from membership in their social group, and so stand the best chance of biological survival, by way of opportunities for
reproduction. From the study of the evolutionary bases of
prejudice, social psychologists Catherine Cottrell and
Steven Neuberg said that human behavioural responses to '
otherness' might enable the preservation of manners and
social norms. The feeling of "foreignness"—which people experience in their first social interaction with someone from another culture—might partly serve an
evolutionary function: 'Group living surrounds one with individuals [who are] able to physically harm fellow group members, to spread contagious disease, or to "free ride" on their efforts'; therefore, a commitment to
sociality is a risk: 'If threats, such as these, are left unchecked, the costs of sociality will quickly exceed its benefits. Thus, to maximize the returns on group "living", individual group members should be attuned to others' features or behaviors.'
Categories Social manners are in three categories: (i) manners of
hygiene, (ii) manners of
courtesy, and (iii) manners of
cultural norm. Each category accounts for an aspect of the functional role that manners play in a society. The categories of manners are based upon the social outcome of behaviour, rather than upon the personal motivation of the behaviour. As a means of social management, the rules of etiquette encompass most aspects of human social interaction; thus, a rule of etiquette reflects an underlying
ethical code and a person's
fashion and
social status. ;Manners of courtesy: concern self-control and good-faith behaviour, by which a person gives priority to the interests of another person, and priority to the interests of a socio-cultural group, in order to be a trusted member of that group. Courtesy manners maximize the benefits of group-living by regulating the nature of social interactions; however, the performance of courtesy manners occasionally interferes with the avoidance of communicable disease. Generally, parents teach courtesy manners in the same way they teach hygiene manners, but the child also learns manners directly (by observing the behaviour of other people in their social interactions) and by imagined social interactions (through the
executive functions of the brain). A child usually learns courtesy manners at an older age than when he or she was toilet trained (taught hygiene manners), because learning the manners of courtesy requires that the child be
self-aware and conscious of
social position, which then facilitate understanding that violations (accidental or deliberate) of social courtesy will provoke peer disapproval within the social group. ;Manners of cultural norms: concern the social rules by which a person establishes their
identity and membership in a given socio-cultural group. In abiding the manners of cultural norm, a person demarcates socio-cultural identity and establishes social boundaries, which then identify whom to trust and whom to distrust as 'the other'. Cultural norm manners are learnt through the enculturation with and the routinisation of 'the familiar', and through social exposure to the '
cultural otherness' of people identified as foreign to the group. Transgressions and flouting of the manners of cultural norm usually result in the
social alienation of the transgressor. The nature of culture-norm manners allows a high level of intra-group variability, but the manners usually are common to the people who identify with the given socio-cultural group. ; 20th century
Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics, and at Home (1922), by
Emily Post documents the "trivialities" of desirable conduct in daily life, and provided pragmatic approaches to the practice of good manners—the social conduct expected and appropriate for the events of life, such as a
baptism, a
wedding, and a
funeral. As didactic texts, books of etiquette (the conventional rules of personal behaviour in polite society) usually feature explanatory titles, such as ''The Ladies' Book of Etiquette, and Manual of Politeness: A Complete Hand Book for the Use of the Lady in Polite Society
(1860), by Florence Hartley; Amy Vanderbilt's Complete Book of Etiquette
(1957); Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior
(1979), by Judith Martin; and Peas & Queues: The Minefield of Modern Manners'' (2013), by
Sandi Toksvig. Such books present ranges of civility, socially acceptable behaviours for their respective times. Each author cautions the reader that to be a well-mannered person they must practise good manners in their
public and
private lives. The
How Rude! comic-book series addresses and discusses adolescent perspectives and questions of etiquette, social manners, and civility.
Business In commerce, the purpose of etiquette is to facilitate the social relations necessary for realising business transactions; in particular, social interactions among workers, and between labour and management. Business etiquette varies by culture, such as the Chinese and Australian approaches to conflict resolution. The Chinese business philosophy is based upon (personal connections), whereby person-to-person negotiation resolves difficult matters, whereas Australian business philosophy relies upon attorneys-at-law to resolve business conflicts through legal mediation; thus, adjusting to the etiquette and professional
ethics of another culture is an element of
culture shock for businesspeople. In 2011, etiquette trainers formed the Institute of Image Training and Testing International (IITTI) a non-profit organisation to train personnel departments in measuring and developing and teaching social skills to employees, by way of education in the rules of personal and business etiquette, in order to produce business workers who possess standardised manners for successfully conducting business with people from other cultures. In the
retail branch of commerce, the saying "the customer is always right" summarises the profit-orientation of good manners, between the buyer and the seller of goods and services: ==See also==