1. Culture
Feb 4, 2014
Pretty is socially constructed. It is our culture that tells us what is beautiful.
Culture provides rules of behavior:
Sudan Lost Boys

2. What is Culture? Do Sociologists Ask?
Ideas and things passed down in society
Knowledge, beliefs, values, rules, language, customs, music, symbols, and material products
Rules to live by– shape how we understand and interact in society: rules, patterns, expectations
Constantly being reshaped, created, and transmitted

3. Ethnocentrism Do Sociologists Ask?
Tendency to view one’s own group’s culture as right or correct, superior to other cultures.
re=endscreen

4. Values, Beliefs, Norms Do Sociologists Ask? Values Beliefs Norms
Shared judgments about what is good/bad -- morals
Environment is worth preserving
Beliefs
Specific ideas we hold about life, about the way society works, and how we fit in the world
Often based on values
Humans have caused global warming
Norms
Rules of behavior shared by members of society
Don’t litter

5. What is American Culture?
Do Sociologists Ask?
What characteristics define American Culture?
Values that define American culture
Norms and behaviors that support the value
Material goods (or symbols) culture creates to reinforce norms and values
These things all work together to create culture.
List norms, values, beliefs – symbols. on board
Show video of Sudan’s Lost boys in Seattle– 8 min.

6. Your Life Do Sociologists Ask? Groups
Tell a story about an important event in your life
Norms
Values
Beliefs
Symbols
These things all work together to create culture.

7. Hegemony Dominant groups decide what is “right”
Get others to go along with status quo because it seems like the natural order of things
Taken for granted truths that go unquestioned
In the US, individualism is hegamonic
Media has a big impact

8. Individualism– a worldview
Belief system that privileges the individual over the group, private life over public, and personal expression over social experience
Autonomy, independence, and self reliance are highly valued
Free actors are in control of their own destiny

9. Myth of Individualism Ignores social forces
Supports capitalist economic system
Suggests patterns of inequality are result of psychological dispositions and biology
Supported by media and key figures
Success and salvation through acts of individuals (usually men)

10. Gang Leader Chapt 2
What do you notice about culture on federal street, Black Kings, and Robert Taylor homes?
Values/beliefs/norms/symbols
How is it similar/different from hegemonic American culture from corporate American culture?

11. Next Week Quiz 2 before midnight tomorrow
Myth of Individualism Chapt 2 (Tues)
Youth Identity Formation (Thur)
Activity Post 3 due before midnight Friday

12. Culture & Media Do Sociologists Ask?
Media and culture mutually reinforce one another
Who decides what we see on TV, radio, news, etc?
What counts as “news”?
Typical girls/womens magazines
6 major companies in US own more than 90% of media
Advertisements and consumerism
Paradox video on culture and media
Move culture and media section to Week 5.1– “Culture, Media, and social construction”
5.2= “Self & Identity” -- Dan

13. How does consumerism work across class?
Allison Pugh interview

14. Miley, You’re a Good Girl
ologysounds/
Cultural ideals celebrate women’s beauty and sexuality
Ideals of masculinity associated with dominating women (rape culture)
Women as innocent, naïve, and in need of protection
Both ideas reinforce male dominance

15. A Mod Carousel Parody Reverses gender Uncomfortable
Desensitized to objectified women

16. Coming Up: Paradox video Activity Posting 3 for Thursday
Book club discussion Thursday– Chapt 2

17. “Communism forgets that life is individual
“Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines elements of both.”
- Martin Luther King Jr.

18. Cultural representations of Masculinity
Daddy’s Hands--
Combats stereotypes
working class men as inept fathers, husbands and workers
supposed stupidity, drunkenness, violent temper, and inability to express emotion
Supports myth of individualism
Unsuccessful because so inept
Can ignore systematic inequalities & lack of opportunity
Culture of concumption– affluenza, Allison Pugh (class differences)