Transcript Symbolic Culture

Symbolic Culture
Components
Symbols
• Sociologists: refer to
nonmaterial culture
as symbolic culture;
component of
nonmaterial culture
is the symbols that
people use.
• Symbols
– Gestures, languages,
values, norms,
sanctions, folkways,
and mores.
Gestures
• Involve the ways in which people use their bodies to
communicate with one another.
• May include everything from hand movements to
facial expressions.
• Different from culture to culture.
– Raising middle finger different meaning through out the
world.
– Facilitates communication but can lead to
embarrassment and misunderstanding if used
inappropriately.
Figure 2.1 Gestures to Indicate Height, Southern Mexico
Language
• Primary way people
communicate: system
of symbols that can be
strung together in an
infinite number of ways.
• As with gestures,
meaning varies from
one culture to another.
• Language is the basis
of culture!
Sanctions
• Sanctions: expressions of
approval or disapproval
given to people for
upholding or violating norms.
– Positive or negative
– Positive: approving looks and
gestures to material rewards
– Negative: disapproval looks
and gestures to fines,
imprisonment, and extreme
cases execution.
• Intensity or severity depends
on how crucial or not so
crucial the group views the
norm
Cultural Universals
• Cultural Universal: a value, norm, or
other cultural trait that is found in
every group
• Sociologists have determined that
although such activities (marriage,
funerals, music, etc.) are present in
all cultures, the specific customs
differ from one group to another.
• No universal form of the family etc.
Cultural Variations
•
What cultural variations
(differences) exist in our
American culture?
• Subcultures: a goup with its
own unique values, norms
and behaviors.
– Teenagers, ethnic groups,
motorcycle enthusiasts
• Countercultures: A subculture
who rejects values, norms,
and practices of the larger
society and replaces it with a
new set of cultural patterns.
–
Satanists, motorcycle
gangs and the mafia.