Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and tables
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 Redirecting incivility research
- 2 The fundamentals of the incivil encounter
- 3 Everyday incivility and the everyday round
- 4 Emotions and sequences
- 5 Gender, age and class: divergent experiences?
- 6 After the event: coping, avoiding and changing
- 7 General attitudes towards the stranger: exploring fear and trust
- 8 How to confront incivility
- 9 Twenty questions and answers
- References
- Index
2 - The fundamentals of the incivil encounter
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and tables
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 Redirecting incivility research
- 2 The fundamentals of the incivil encounter
- 3 Everyday incivility and the everyday round
- 4 Emotions and sequences
- 5 Gender, age and class: divergent experiences?
- 6 After the event: coping, avoiding and changing
- 7 General attitudes towards the stranger: exploring fear and trust
- 8 How to confront incivility
- 9 Twenty questions and answers
- References
- Index
Summary
Although this will be a simple and short chapter it will break new ground. Our aim is to answer some fundamental and often asked questions about public rudeness in a systematic way. How often do people encounter it? What is it? Where does it happen? Who does it? Is it deliberate or accidental? Who experiences victimization? Using some basic statistics we will be able to draw up a portrait of the kinds of events and people that are to be found in the world of everyday incivility. We can start with the most basic issue of all. What is logically needed for an incivil encounter with a rude stranger to take place in public? The answer is simple. There are three components: first, there must be an action interpreted as incivil that occurs in a public setting; second, this is committed by a stranger, either by accident or deliberately; third, it is experienced by a self-described victim. Here we look at each of these in turn. In effect, we will describe what happened and where, who did it and to whom.
The rude event
First, how prevalent are encounters with rude strangers? The ELIAS data show that about a third of respondents reported a rude event during the past month (508 of 1,621 respondents, or 31 per cent). As one might expect, the likelihood of encountering this type of incivility is substantially higher than more invasive interpersonal events such as crime victimizations.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- IncivilityThe Rude Stranger in Everyday Life, pp. 23 - 40Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010