Framing and Social Movements

Abstract

Abstract Framing, within the context of social movements, refers to the signifying work or meaning construction engaged in by movement adherents (e.g., leaders, activists, and rank‐and‐file participants) and other actors (e.g., adversaries, institutional elites, media, social control agents, countermovements) relevant to the interests of movements and the challenges they mount in pursuit of those interests. The concept of framing is borrowed from Erving Goffman's Frame Analysis (1974) and is rooted in the symbolic interactionist and constructionist principle that meanings do not naturally or automatically attach themselves to the objects, events, or experiences we encounter, but arise, instead, through interpretive processes mediated by culture. Frames contribute to this interpretive work by performing three core functions. First, like picture frames, they focus attention by punctuating or bracketing what in our sensual field is relevant and what is irrelevant, what is “in‐frame” and what is “out‐of‐frame,” in relation to the object of orientation. Second, they function as articulation mechanisms in the sense of tying together the various punctuated elements of the scene so that one set of meanings rather than another is conveyed, or, in the language of narrativity, one story rather than another is told. And third, frames often perform a transformative function by reconstituting the way in which some objects of attention are seen or understood as relating to each other or to the actor. Examples of this transformative function in the context of social movements are illustrated by the transformation of routine grievances or misfortunes into injustices or mobilizing grievances, and by the reconfiguration of aspects of one's biography as commonly occurs in both political and religious conversion. Given the focusing, articulation, and transformative functions of frames, it is arguable that how we see, what we make of, and how we act toward the various objects of orientation that populate our daily lives depends, in no small part, on how they are framed. Applied to social movements, the idea of framing problematizes the meanings associated with relevant events, activities, places, and actors, suggesting that those meanings are typically contestable and negotiable and thus open to debate and differential interpretation. From this vantage point, mobilizing grievances are seen neither as naturally occurring sentiments nor as arising automatically from specifiable material conditions, but as the result of interactively based interpretation or signifying work. The verb framing conceptualizes this signifying work, which is one of the activities that social movement leaders and participants, as well as their adversaries, do on a regular basis.