ancient cities

774 Streetcars
that this silent “talking” occurred as much
between strangers as between acquaintances.
Following the leads provided by Simmel and
Goffman, researchers interested in the biographical
stranger have focused on such questions
as: What cues do people use to identify
people they don’t know? Under what conditions
do strangers initiate verbal interaction? How is it
possible for people to cross crowded intersections
without collision? How do people learn to
make stranger encounters routine? What role
do these encounters play in the creation and recreation
of, or challenges to, status inequalities?
How do cultural differences affect
interaction between and among strangers? In
addressing such questions, researchers have
documented much about the patterning of city
life to challenge many widespread beliefs. For
example, they have found that stranger interaction
is remarkably orderly and generally peaceful;
that the maintenance of privacy and
avoidance in stranger-filled settings does not
occur “naturally” but must be interactionally
achieved; and that such settings may also be
sociability-rich and sources of considerable personal
pleasure. In addition, through their explorations
of the many relational forms that exist
between strangers on the one side and acquaintances
and intimates on the other, researchers
have begun to challenge the validity of the
dichotomy itself. A complex typology of relationships
has thus emerged which identifies the
fleeting relationship, the quasi-primary relationship,
and the intimate-secondary relationship,
among many others. However, despite the relatively
benign portrait of stranger interaction
they have drawn, researchers have also discovered
that even after 200 years of increasing
urbanization, for many people, “the stranger” is
seen as a figure of menace, a criminal, a threat
to self and family, and especially a threat to
children. To the degree that Americans continue
to express antipathy toward urban spaces, especially
densely packed urban spaces, they are
often expressing antipathy toward the biographical
stranger.
See also Public Realm; Simmel, Georg
Lyn H. Lofland
Further Readings
Agar, Michael. 1996. The Professional Stranger: An
Informal Introduction to Ethnography. San Diego,
CA: Academic Press.
Goffman, Erving. 1963. Behavior in Public Places: Notes
on the Social Organization of Gatherings. New York:
The Free Press.
Golovensky, David I. 1952. “The Marginal Man
Concept: An Analysis and Critique.” Social Forces
30:333–39.
Levine, Donald N. 1979. “Simmel at a Distance: On the
History and Systematics of the Sociology of the
Stranger.” In Strangers in African Societies, edited by
W. A. Schack and E. P. Skinner. Berkeley: University
of California Press.
Lofland, Lyn H. 1973. A World of Strangers: Order and
Action in Urban Public Space. New York: Basic
Books.
Park, Robert E. 1925. “Human Migration and the
Marginal Man.” The American Journal of Sociology
33:881–93.
Schutz, Alfred. 1944. “The Stranger: An Essay in Social
Psychology.” The American Journal of Sociology
49:499–507.
Simmel, Georg. [1903] 1950. “The Metropolis and Mental
Life.” In The Sociology of Georg Simmel. Translated
and edited by K. H. Wolf. Glencoe, IL: The Free Press.
———. [1908] 1924. “Sociology of the Senses: Visual
Interaction.” In Introduction to the Science of
Sociology, edited by R. E. Park and E. W. Burgess.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
———. [1908] 1950. “The Stranger.” In The Sociology
of Georg Simmel. Translated and edited by K. H.
Wolf. Glencoe, IL: The Free Press.
Stonequist, Everett V. 1937. The Marginal Man: A Study
in Personality and Culture Conflict. New York:
Scribner.
Waldinger, Roger, ed. 2001. Strangers at the Gates: New
Immigrants in Urban America. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
St r e e t c a r S
From the 1880s to at least the 1930s, streetcars
provided the main means of transport in cities
across the world. Horse-pulled and later electrically
powered railways constituted the means by which
many urban centers underwent an unprecedented
physical and demographic expansion. Streetcars