ABSTRACT
For a century sociology has subscribed to a naive mythology about rules and norms that has failed to understand their real nature. Without deviating far from the common sense préjugé du monde, sociologists have mostly viewed the authority of rules as deriving independently of the local situation. Rules are essential tools for organizing the orderliness of interaction, and they do instruct parties how to best concert themselves, but they are protean idealities whose effectiveness depends upon how parties teach each other what they are and how to apply them within each local situation; i.e., rules are resources that people can use in successfully coordinating their activities. Here we examine a perspicuous case of how surfers select, develop, clarify, and instruct each other how to use the many rules of the “lineup” to maximize the opportunities to ride waves in a safe and, on occasion, predictable manner.
