Dangerous Giants

Michael Hviid Jacobsen

Michael Hviid Jacobsen

Aalborg University, Denmark

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Abstract

This entry concerns the notion of “dangerous giants” as formulated by Erving Goffman in a 1961 essay. It explores the concept of “dangerous giant,” which is concerned with pointing out the potential disruption that individuals or groups of people may exert in social situations either incidentally or deliberately. Such “dangerous giants,” according to Goffman, threaten the social situation because they question, ridicule, or undermine that which everybody else takes for granted. Although the notion of “dangerous giant” was only used once by Goffman, this entry discusses how the concept also has broader implications in social research.

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