Sociology of friendship

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The sociology of friendship is a sub-discipline of sociology . It deals with the contents, forms and functions of friendship . In contrast to philosophy , which already dealt with the phenomenon of friendship in antiquity ( Plato , Aristotle ), it only became a subject of sociology late. Relevant contributions were made by Georg Simmel , Siegfried Kracauer and Friedrich Tenbruck . An introductory work was only published in 2016 under the title Friendship Today. An introduction to the sociology of friendship . The six authors - Janosch Schobin, Vincenz Leuschner, Sabine Flick, Erika Alleweldt, Eric Anton Heuser, Agnes Brandt - discuss basic knowledge and problem areas of friendship.

The forerunners

The philosopher and sociologist Georg Simmel understands friendship as a “form of social interaction”. He distinguishes the modern form of friendship from the classic and romantic ideal of friendship through the "differentiated friendships" that arise in the social process with increasing differentiation and individualization, which no longer connect friends with the whole breadth of personality, but only in certain areas of existence.

For the sociologist Siegfried Kracauer, friendship means "the harmony of personalities". Unlike the love relationship, it is not dependent on the constant presence of the other person, but can also exist over distances and find expression in letters.

The cultural sociologist Friedrich Tenbruck understands friendship as "a form of personal relationship that is based on free choice of partner and is able to stabilize the individual." Especially when the individual is released from traditional forms of existence and unsettled in processes of social change , the stabilizing function of friendship takes hold and functions then as an “addition to an incomplete social structure ”. Tenbruck sees two exemplary friendship epochs in Greek antiquity and German romanticism, each with strong processes of social change.

Friendship today

In a collective review, Walther Müller-Jentsch summarized the most important findings of the new sub-discipline in eight points: 1. Friendship is a social universal , albeit culturally and - within a culture - historically variable. 2. Friendship is - in western countries - a dyadic social relationship between people of similar age, similar education and same sex, who are not related to one another and also have no love relationship with one another. 3. Friendship is a social (small) system that is coded alongside love through the communication medium of intimacy , understood as "interpersonal interpenetration " (Niklas Luhmann) . 4. Friendship is based on the exchange of symbolic pledges of life (intimate secrets) that make friends vulnerable. 5. Important characteristics of friendship are: voluntariness, intimacy, reciprocity , equality / equality ( homogeneity ), permanence, lived practice. 6. The functions of friendships include care in the broadest sense, that is, emotional support (trust, assistance, social support, self-confidence), cognitive (stimulation and information), and material (monetary and practical help). Art. 7. Friendships come achieved through spatial and social proximity in opportunity structures (focus) that enable repeated communications and interactions (field). 8. A generalization of the differences between male and female friendships found in empirical studies is problematic. Gender effects are attributed to different social positions.

According to the results of a survey by YouGov and the Sinus Institute published in 2018, two thirds of people in Germany have a “best friend” or a “best friend”. On average, they give 3.7 close friends, 11 people in their extended circle of friends and 42.5 people in their circle of acquaintances.

literature

  • Siegfried Kracauer : About friendship. Essays . Suhrkamp. Frankfurt am Main 1971.
  • Walther Müller-Jentsch : Sociology of friendship - a new hyphenated sociology (collective discussion). In: Soziologische Revue, Vol. 40, H. 3, pp. 356–368.
  • Janosch Schobin / Vincenz Leuschner / Sabine Flick / Erika Alleweldt / Eric Anton Heuser / Agnes Brand: Friendship Today. An introduction to the sociology of friendship (with guest contributions by Andrea Knecht, Christian Kühner and Kai Marquardsen). transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2016.

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Janosch Schobin, Vincenz Leuschner, Sabine Flick, Erika Alleweldt, Eric Anton Heuser, Agnes Brandt: Friendship Today. An introduction to the sociology of friendship. transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2016, p. 39.
  2. ↑ Georg Simmel. Sociology. Studies on the forms of socialization (complete edition, volume 11). Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1992, p. 401.
  3. ↑ Janosch Schobin, Vincenz Leuschner, Sabine Flick, Erika Alleweldt, Eric Anton Heuser, Agnes Brandt: Friendship Today. An introduction to the sociology of friendship. transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2016, p. 43.
  4. ^ Walther Müller-Jentsch: Sociology of friendship - a new hyphenated sociology (collective discussion). In: Soziologische Revue, vol. 40 (2017), no. 3, p. 357 f.
  5. ^ Friedrich Tenbruck: Friendship. A contribution to a sociology of personal relationships. In: Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie, Vol. 16 (1964), H. 3. P. 453.
  6. ^ Walther Müller-Jentsch: Sociology of friendship - a new hyphenated sociology (collective discussion). In: Soziologische Revue, vol. 40 (2017), no. 3, p. 367 f.
  7. ↑ Germans have 3.7 close friends - open communication and care are most important in a friendship. In: yougov.de. July 27, 2018, accessed February 8, 2020 .