All social forms are defined to some extent in terms of the dimension of interpersonal distance. Some forms, like conflict, bring distant people into close contact. Others, like secrecy, increase the distance between people. Some forms organize gradations of vertical distance, whereas others are forms for organizing horizontal distances. Forms like the stranger and fashion entail distinctive combinations of both nearness and distance.

DEFINE: This frames social forms as fundamentally organized around a distance dimension, providing a conceptual lens for analyzing sociality.

DEFINE: Defines a key conceptual lens — interpersonal distance — for analyzing social forms, applicable to Simmel's framework. Builds on: "Different worlds hold objects at varying distances from the individual."

Georg Simmel, on individuality and social…, loc. 81