Transcript Forming the Self and Collective Expression

Forming the Self and
Collective Expression
Family and Place
• We all learn valuable lessons from
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others and from life experiences,
sometimes with pleasure and
sometimes the hard way. Beginning
at an early age, these lessons form
us from the inside out.
We watch others for signs of how the
sexes express themselves and relate
to one another
We watch to see where someone our
age fits into a family
We learn the roles of family members
We learn ‘how our family is’ relative
to neighbors, friends, others in the
community
We learn about the community and
region we inhabit
We learn who are ‘people like us’ (ex:
hard-working Italian-American
Catholic Democrats who are good
cooks and reliable friends)
Learning Values
• Values are beliefs held by a person or social
group in which there is an emotional investment
• These are practical lessons with an underlying
logic which is widely shared by your group
• Often, how we look outside (the color of our skin,
how thin/fat or young/old or beautiful/ugly we
are) is what people use to make judgements
about us.
Self-Worth
• Tied to personal values and accomplishment in socially constructed
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roles
Also tied to approval---after all we are primates—so this is a
dialectical relationship
People who love us tell us that superficial things don’t matter, it’s
“what’s inside that counts,” but rejection and ridicule (and the fear
of it) still brings frustration, rage, sadness, and depression to many
people and profoundly modifies their behavior.
It is easy to be hard on ourselves, because no one can live up to
both their own and others’ standards.
Today the particularly invidious role of the media (individuals,
attitudes, values) in providing role models contributes greatly to
assessments of self-worth
Stress
• Has always been a part of human
existence.
• In today’s world, stress shows up
in even more forms.
• Disease, mental illness, and selfabusive behaviors are positively
correlated with stress. The
manner in which people react to
stress varies culturally.
• Stress Kills (overdosing on
adrenalin--‘fight or flight’ chemical
defense of the body--has direct
physical effects–heart attacks,
even death as in voodoo)
What do People do to Reduce
Stress and Feel Better about
Themselves?
• Social responses: seeking out
friends, volunteer work
• Economic responses: buy
something (“when the going
gets tough, the tough go
shopping”)
• Chemical responses: physical
activity, mind-altering
substances (Reefer Madness,
Hooked), eating, fasting
• Spiritual responses: religion,
other spiritual training (such as
out-of-body experiences–the
classroom example will be the
Ghost Dance)
Our Consuming Society
• In our consumer-oriented
culture, we are easy prey to
those who offer to make us
thinner, younger, and more
beautiful---to make us hip,
cool, phat.
• Addictive behavior: economic,
social, sexual, whatever--compromises health and
reinforces negative feelings
about self.
• Food is an important means by
which we partake in society–
we eat culture.
Food and Identity
• One very important answer is
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food.
Ethnic groups define themselves
on the basis of shared history and
culture; cultural differences are
most often marked by
characteristic foods
How do the groups we belong to
make us feel stronger and happier?
Communal consumption (family
feasts, church suppers, executive
lunches, funeral food, etc)
Solo consumption (comfort food,
often food that affects our bodies
in particular ways, such as
chocolate or starch)
An Italian Dinner in the 1940s
Food Defines us in National and
International Terms
• Food as Diplomat
• Food as Keeper or Destroyer of
values
ex: French cuisine’s position
among the world’s cuisines;
French cuisine vs. Middle Eastern
cuisine in contemporary France;
US McDonald’s
• Food Fights and Food Wars
exs: US/European Union standoff
over genetically modified
organisms (GMOs), globalization
and fast food, freedom fries