Mol 34: "In 1959, Goffman borrowed the language of the theater to talk about human subjects. When people present themselves to each other, Goffman said, they present not so much themselves as a self, a persona, a mask. They act as if they were on a stage. They perform. In everyday life people present themselves to each other. And while acting, they treat the other people present both as their coactors and the audience of their play [...] With his suggestion that we might investigate performances, Goffman opened up the possibility of a sociology of the individual. He launched a study of social selves."
See also William James on the social self, a generation earlier