Conformity and Status Effectiveness: Universal Sharing and the Role of Tokens

A necessary step in statuses being generally effective is specific statuses being effective, with some of these contributing materially to the effectiveness

of others. In Old Town, and probably everywhere, among the statuses that contribute most broadly to the effectiveness of other statuses, there are inclusive categories that are rarely given names but might be referred to as "community member" or "decent person." These statuses, and their identifiers are historical and associational, involve a quite limited range of expectations, including those based on the few universally shared understandings about what must and must not be done (see above). Nevertheless, they play an important part in promoting the general effectiveness of many of the community's statuses.

A substantial part of the effectiveness of these statuses derives from the expectations of others understood as characteristic of those categorized in them. Importantly, these include highly visible behaviors, mostly of the sort that are carried out (or, more often, avoided) in public. To be well thought of by "decent people/community members" is understood to entail a broad range of behaviors. If one fails to meet expectations for obvious, publicly performed activities, one is likely to be negatively evaluated for the whole range. Conversely, and importantly, if one meets the expectations for public behavior, one is at least eligible for positive evaluation in far more significant domains.

The consequences of the community member status extend beyond the restricted, direct guidance they provide for group members' overt behavior. These derive from the fact that behavior guided by them serves to reassure community members that those around them are like them, that the base for the predictability that is indispensable to social life is present. Even between community members who have substantial differences in their understandings of emotionally charged issues, there are exchanges of tokens that give them reassuring indications that they share beliefs and values allowing continuation of their relationships with one another.

In chapter 6, the tokens involved in generational relations were seen to contribute to their continuation despite serious differences in understandings concerned with the foundations for such relations. The tokens in the form of statements in a particular context gave each of the age groups a basis for believing that those in the other group were willing to take their sensibilities into account by suggesting sharing in areas where, at least as concerns the guidance of much behavior, it does not exist. The assertions members of each age group make about the sources of intergenerational strife provide tokens for the members of the other grouping.

"Tokens" are functionally defined. Any symbolic exchange in which the participants directly or indirectly indicate to one another that there is substantial sharing of understandings between them involves an exchange of tokens. These tokens may also be guides for behavior beyond the exchange in which they occur, but they need not be. The symbols that serve as tokens are not all expressed in speech. By never appearing naked and, probably more impor-

tant in daily life, by appearing in the kind of clothes community members regularly wear,^[8] Swahili proclaim their membership in the group.

By dressing as other group members do and by wearing clothing slightly different from that of the members of any other group, group members give one another tokens suggesting that there are important similarities uniting them and differentiating them from people outside the community. They show that they accept the identifying symbols of being a "community member" and thereby can be taken as predictable and safe for interpersonal relations. Indicating interest in and agreement about important issues reinforces and continues this.

If it can be accepted that interaction is vital for social relationships, that the functioning of social relationships is vital for statuses, and that statuses are at the heart of culture's general effectiveness, then tokens can be seen to play a significant part in cultural dynamics through their contribution to the interaction. Tokens can be based in understandings that are also guides, but even when that is not so, they contribute to social life through promoting what might be called a social and psychological "medium" that is conducive to interaction.