APPLICATION # 2 SOC 1111: CULTURE What follows is an outline of WHAT culture is, WHY humans came up with it,...

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APPLICATION # 2 SOC 1111: CULTURE

What follows is an outline of WHAT culture is, WHY humans came up with it, WHAT components it is made up of no matter what society, and WHAT we humans do in response to CULTURAL VARIATIONS we come into contact with. CULTURE is something we can “see” into, but OUR OWN CULTURE biases how we see into that of others.

Once you have reviewed (and you may need to refer back) to the concepts and how I’ve attempted to explain and link them together, the APPLICATION assignment becomes one of either PROVIDING examples and explaining them, or, of RESPONDING to examples I provide to you and explaining those. Look further down, then, past the “notes” on all the mentioned concepts for what you must provide back to me (twenty questions).

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NOTES/ CONCEPTS TO BE APPLIED IN THIS ASSIGNMENT

Culture Components: TOOLS/ TECHNOLOGY, BELIEFS, NORMS, VALUES, and LANGUAGE

The second lesson for our course is that much of the lens we use WITHOUT SOCIOLOGY and then the lens WITH SOCIOLOGY used to see ourselves and each other is the lens of CULTURE.

Why CULTURE/ CULTURAL CONTEXT

I feel it is critical to see Issues of status differences and power as effectively as we can. That is the goal of SOCIOLOGY for all subject matter.

I review in class/ posted notes that we do these things in ways WITHOUT sociology, but could do so more effectively in ways WITH sociology.

Not just personal, but SOCIAL ways.

Not just subjective, but OBJECTIVE ways.

Not just with common sense, but with (SOCIAL) SCIENCE ways.

Not only CAN we see our chances we can ONLY see our chances when we look more SOCIALLY, OBJECTIVELY and SCIENTIFICALLY.

The result, we develop more ACCURATE, COMPLETE, and THOROUGH answers to a variety of questions about RELATIONSHIPS, MARRIAGE and FAMILY.

And doing these things is WHAT SOCIOLOGY does by its very construction, by its methods of research and by use of its theories that serve to organize explanations, generalizations AND predictions about our lives.

But much of our lives (if not nearly all) is part of what we in social science see as “CULTURE” and cultural elements or components. So… we use what I have just outlined by putting things into CULTURAL CONTEXT to get our most accurate, complete and thorough explanations, generalizations and predictions.

CULTURE à The way of life of a people; the human-created strategies for adjusting to the environment and to those creatures that are a part of that environment.

a) a set of beliefs, traditions, and practices;

b) the sum total of social categories and concepts we embrace in addition to beliefs, behaviors (except instinctual ones), and practices;

c) that which is NOT the natural environment around us.

1. Culture is comprised of MATERIAL and NONMATERIAL categories with the overall components of culture being in one or the other, with a total of FIVE overall components.

2. MATERIAL CULTURE includes the component of à TOOLS/ TECHNOLOGY

3. NONMATERIAL CULTURE includes the components of à BELIEFS, NORMS, VALUES, & LANGUAGE.

4. Culture is intended to ‘solve’ the problems of living.

5. Culture is entirely HUMAN-MADE content/ components.

6. All viable societies have a viable culture.

CATEGORY 1 of two) Material culture/Material Cultural Components

All the natural and human-made objects which people have attached meaning.

Everything that is a part of our constructed physical environment, including technology.

Component #1 of five (Material) > Tools/Technology

Physical “things” used to manipulate our physical world.

CATEGORY 2 of two) Nonmaterial Culture/Nonmaterial Cultural Components

Intangible human creations, which we cannot identify directly thru our senses

Components #2 of five (Non Material) > Beliefs

Conceptions that people accept as true, concerning how the world operates and where the individual fits in relationship to others.

Statements/conceptualizations about reality that we share and use to determine which is real/true.

From beliefs, we get IDEOLOGY à

a) sets of beliefs used to explain and justify the way things are, or, the way they should be.

b) a system of concepts and relationships that promotes an understanding of ‘cause and effect’.

** like beliefs, ideologies may be accurate or inaccurate.

Components #3 of five (Non Material) > Norms

Written/unwritten rules that specify BEHAVIORS appropriate and inappropriate to a particular social situation.

Standards of desirable behavior in a given situation.

How VALUES tell us how to BEHAVE.

Component #4 of five (Non Material) > Values

General, shared conceptions of what is good (or bad), right (or wrong), appropriate (or inappropriate), worthwhile (or worthless), and important (or unimportant) with regard to conduct, appearance, and states of being.

VALUES: moral beliefs.

Component #5 of five (Non Material) > Language

A symbol system involving the use of sounds, gestures, (signing), and/or characters (such as letters or pictures) to convey meaning.

The significance of Language

** Consider the other components: how would they come across or ever get shared?

** Consider new elements of our lives and new problems of living: how would we collectively share ways to respond to them?

** Consider changing culture: how would we create the changes and how would they be passed along?

Answersà THE CULTURAL COMPONENT/ TOOL OF LANGUAGE

Culture, Cultural Variations, Culture Shock, Ethnocentrism, and Cultural Relativity: Understanding Across Difference:

In this assignment, I want to get you to look into CULTURAL VARIATION, the CULTURE SHOCK that may come next, the ETHNOCENTRIMS that subjectively attempts to answer questions about the variations, and the need for CULTURAL RELATIVISM to get to a more sociological and objective view of the variations.

Some background “notes” to review and consider before you follow thru on what I’m asking for in this assignment:

How we perceive and deal with CULTURAL VARIATION is not only important, but follows patterns with labels for concepts that describe what goes on along the way. It has always fascinated sociologists and anthropologists how we HAVE cultural variations and how we DEAL with them coming from others.

In lecture/ class, I have started in on WHAT Culture is and WHAT role it plays in our lives. I’ve also started in on HOW Culture becomes a filter for how we SEE each other and each other’s Culture. We are going to review the FIVE overall components of a viable culture (1. tools, 2. beliefs, 3. norms, 4. values & 5. Language) and their combined cultural expressions.

Note that cultural variations will appear in the five cultural components of So it is in these areas that we can explore cultural variations.

Here’s how the responses to cultural variations line up …

Cultural Variation à Culture Shock

Culture shock à The strain that people from one culture experience when they must reorient themselves sto the ways of a new culture.

* Cultural Shock leads to attempts to ask questions and arrive at answers. This takes a subjective stop along the way with …

Culture Shock à Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism/Ethnocentricityà a viewpoint that uses one culture, usually the home culture (or when occurring WITHIN a society, this is the dominant/larger culture), as the standard for judging the worth of foreign ways (or, again, when occurring WITHIN a society, this is a subculture/counterculture being so viewed).

Put another way, Ethnocentrism is the judging, assessing, evaluating a cultural variation (or entire culture) that varies from us against the home culture’s standards.

* Since Ethnocentrism is biased against one culture in favor of another (usually the home culture), the answers we arrive at are subjective and, therefore, limited how accurately, completely and thoroughly we have come to see and understand the culture and their variations. To get to a more objective understanding, we must get to Cultural Relativity.

Going on with our CULTURE concepts …

Ethnocentricity à Cultural Relativity

* This is NOT a given as it takes conscious, concerted effort to move from ETHNOCENTRISM (subjectivity) to CULTURAL RELATIVITY (objectivity).

Definition of Cultural Relativity

The perspective that a foreign culture (or particular subculture or counterculture) should NOT be judged by the standards of a home culture (or, by the standards of the larger/dominant culture when occurring WITHIN a society), and that a behavior or way of thinking must be examined in its OWN cultural context.

Put another way, Cultural Relativism is the process of taking into account differences across cultures without passing judgment or assigning value (from one to the other).

Lastly …

* The fact is, not all cultural variation is between entire societies/ cultures. Some of it clearly occurs between subsets of a single culture (within societies). Each “subset” of all the subsets within a particular culture is referred to as a SUBCULTURE. Therefore, each subculture may respond to another subculture within society with culture shock, ethnocentrism and will necessarily need to consciously get to Cultural Relativity in order to accurately, thoroughly and completely (answer for) and “see” and try to “understand” thru the cultural variation. In a slight variation on this, a given SUBCULTURE may view the larger CULTLURE with culture shock and ethnocentrism before doing the work to see them in a more culturally relative way and vice versa (the larger culture can do this to a particular subculture).

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NOW, IT’S YOUR TIME TO DO APPLICATIONS

EXAMPLES AND RESPONSES FROM YOU FOR APPLICATION # 2: CULTURE

You could type in your responses and then cut down this doc to JUST the responses which start HERE before saving, then putting back into the ASSIGNMENT FOLDER. There are 15 for you to work through.

** You may need to COPY and PASTE a link I provide into a new window to get it to open for you.

Name: _________________________________________________

Provide ONE example of a video clip OR article link found online for EACH of the FIVE cultural components and paste that link for each of the five.

1. Tools/ Technology:

a. Provide to me an EXAMPLE that has the link/ clip à paste the link here: