Culture and Socialization

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Chapter 2

• Culture and Socialization

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What is Culture?

• Beliefs, values, behavior, and material objects
  that, together, form a peoples way of life
• Material culture physical or technological
  aspects of our daily lives
• Nonmaterial culture - beliefs

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Culture

• Cultural universals general practices found in
  every culture including courtship, family,
  language, medicine, religion, and sex
  restrictions
• Cultural diffusion process by which a cultural
  item spreads from group to group

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What is the purpose of culture?

• Our major mode of adaptation
• Sets limits on behavior and guides us along
  predictable paths
• Becomes internalized
• Doxa things so deeply internalized that they
  come to be seen as natural

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Characteristics of Culture

• Culture is shared
• uniquely
• Culture is learned
• Cultural transmission passing of cultural
  traits from one generation to the next

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Characteristics of Culture

• Culture is based on symbols
• Symbol anything that carries a particular
  meaning recognized by people who share culture
• Language a system of symbols that allows people
  to communicate with each other
• Language is our most important symbolic system
• Ensures the continuity of culture
• Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis people perceive the
  world through the cultural lens of language

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Characteristics of Culture

• Culture is integrated
• Cannot change one element without impacting
  another
• Cultural integration close relationship among
  various elements of a cultural system
• Cultural lag period of maladjustment when on
  element of culture changes and disrupts a system
• Change caused by
• Invention creating new elements
• Discovery understanding an idea not fully
  understood before
• Diffusion spread of cultural traits

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Non Material Culture

• Values culturally defined standards which serve
  as broad guideline for social living
• Beliefs- specific statements which people hold to
  be true

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Non Material Culture

• Norms rules and expectations by which society
  guides the behavior of its members
• Mores norms that are widely observed and have
  great moral significance
• Folkways norms for routine, casual interaction

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Cultural Diversity

• High culture cultural patterns that distinguish
  a societys elite
• Popular culture cultural patterns that are
  widespread among a societys population
• Subcultures cultural patterns that distinguish
  some segment of a societys population

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Cultural Diversity

• Counterculture cultural patterns that strongly
  oppose those widely accepted in society

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Cultural Diversity

• Ethnocentrism the practice of judging another
  culture by the standards of ones own culture
• Cultural relativism the practice of judging a
  culture by its own standards

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Socialization

• Lifelong social experiences by which individuals
  develop their human potential and learn culture
• Personality a persons fairly consistent
  patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting
• Self a dimension of personality composed of an
  individuals self-awareness and self-image

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Personality
Enculturation
Cultural Transmission
Hardwiring
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Sigmund Freuds Personality Model

• Id the human beings basic drives
• Ego a persons conscious efforts to balance
  innate pleasure-seeking drives with the demands
  of society
• Superego the operation of culture within the
  individual

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Jean Piaget Stages of Cognitive Development

• 1st stage sensorimotor level of human
  development in which individuals experience the
  world only through sensory contact
• 2nd stage preoperational individuals first
  use language and other symbols

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Jean Piaget Stages of Cognitive Development

• Stage 3 concrete operational individuals
  first perceive causal connections in their
  surroundings
• Stage 4 formal operational individuals think
  abstractly and critically

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George Herbert Mead

• Stages of self
• 1st stage Preparatory stage children imitate
  people around them
• 2nd stage Play stage- role taking mentally
  assuming the perspective of another
• 3rd stage Game stage- can consider tasks and
  relationships simultaneously

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Erik Erikson

• 8 stages of development
• Stage 1 Infancy trust vs. distrust
• Stage 2 - Toddlerhood autonomy vs. doubt and
  shame
• Stage 3 Preschool Initiative vs. guilt
• Stage 4 Pre-Adolescence industriousness vs.
  inferiority

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Erik Erikson

• Stage 5 Adolescence identity vs. confusion
• Stage 6 Young Adulthood Intimacy vs.
  isolation
• Stage 7 Middle Adulthood Making a difference
  vs. Self-absorption
• Stage 8 Old Age integrity vs. despair

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Charles Horton Cooley

• Looking glass self we learn who we are by
  interacting with others
• Imagine how we are presenting ourselves
• Imagine how people are evaluating us
• Form opinions about ourselves based on our
  perceptions

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Agents of Socialization

• Family the most important agent of
  socialization
• Peer groups
• School
• media

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Forced Socialization

• Anticipatory socialization social learning
  geared toward gaining a desired position
• Resocialization altering personality through
  deliberate control of the environment
• Total Institution all aspects of a persons
  life are under one authority