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An Ethnographyo f
Bar Behavior
SHERRI CAVAN
BY
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ALDINE Publishing Company / Chicago
Copyright © 1966 by Sherri Cavan
All rights reserved
First published 1966 by
Aldine Publishing Company
320 West Adams Street
Chicago, Illinois 60606
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 66-15199
Designed by· David Miller
Printed in the United States of America
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Let there be ever so great a plenty of good things,
ever so much grandeur, ever so much elegance, ever
so much desire that every guest should be easy,· in the
nature of things it cannot be. There must always be
some degree of care and anxiety. The master of the
house is anxious to be agreeable to him, and no one
but a very impudent boy can as freely command
what is in another man's house as if it were his own.
Whereas at a tavern there is a general freedom from
anxiety. You are sure you are welcome and the more
noise you make, the more trouble you give, the more
good things you call for, the welcomer you are. No
servants will attend you with the alacrity which waiters
do who are incited by the prospect of an immediate
reward in proportion as they please. No sir; there is
nothing which has yet been contrived by man by which
so much happiness is produced as by a good taverr
or inn.
SAMUEL JOHNSON
V
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Acknowledgments
The extent to which I am indebted to Erving Goffman is only
partially footnoted in the text. In addition to his published
works, his suggestions, criticisms, and assistance as my disserta
tion advisor throughout the course of the study have been in
valuable. Appreciation is also due Harold Wilensky and Andie
Knutson, who served as members of my dissertation committee.
Suggestions, advice, criticism, and assistance have come
from many quarters. I should particularly like to thank the
Scientific Advisory Council of Licensed Beverage Industries,
Inc., for the grant that supported the collection of much of the
data. To my past associates at the Behavioral Science Project
of the School of Public Health, University of California at
Berkeley, particularly to Joan P. Emerson, Octavio Romano,
and Steven Polgar, I am grateful for many hours of informative
discussion and advice. To Christine Peterson, who typed numer
ous drafts, a special word of thanks is due, as it is to Paula
Philbrick and Jo Pearson for a variety of forms of administra
tive assistance. A word of appreciation is also owed to Don C.
Gibbons for the final preparation of the map.
I am grateful as well to Pat Thalheimer and Martin Hoff
man, who helped with various phases of the field work, and
especially to my husband, Phillip Cavan, for things which are
publicly acknowledgeable (such as assistance, suggestions, criti
cisms, editing, and encouragement) as well as for things which
are not.
vii
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Contents
Part One: IN T Ro Du c T I o N
1. Behavior Settings 3
2. The Public Drinking Place: An Overview 23
Part Two: s TA N D I N G p A T T E R N s
OF BEHAVIOR
3. Bar Sociability 49
4. Permissible Behavior and Normal Trouble 67
5. Space and Spatial Proprieties 8 8
6. Rituals and Ceremonies 112
Part Three: VA RI AT I O N S I N U S E
7. The Convenience Bar 143
8. The Nightspot 154
9. The Marketplace Bar 171
10. The Home Territory Bar 205
11. Conclusion 234
Index 242
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PART ONE
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Introduction
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1
Behavior Settings
For the actor involved in the round of daily life, the social world
is differentiated into configurations of time, space, and objects
called churches, factories, restaurants, homes, parks, courts,
doctors' offices, and the like. Associated with these configura
tions, or conventional settings, is a standing pattern of behavior,
routinely expected within the setting, treated as fitting and
proper for the time and place, and persistently independent of
the changing populace.1
These standing behavior patterns associated with the con
ventional settings of everyday life are the taken-for-granted,
common-sense features of social organization. 2 They define for
the actor what activity can take place as a matter of course
and without question, and for what conduct those present will
be held accountable.
They may further delimit who is or is not eli_giblet o enter
a given setting, the ways the routine tasks are to be distributed,
the varieties of reputations that can be accorded to those enter
ing, the kinds of fates that can be allotted to those present, and
the like. Thus for the actor involved in the round of daily life,
these taken-for-granted, common-sense features of social or
ganization are a matter of practical interest. Whatever his goals
1. Roger Barker and Herbert Wright, Midwest and Its Children
(Evanston, Ill.: Row, Peterson), pp. 7, 45-83.
2. Alfred Schutz, Collected Papers, I (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff,
1962), p. 7.
3
