Transcript Week 1 - Ariane Zambiras

Sociology of Culture
Soc. 160
Professor: Ariane Zambiras
Fall 2014
Donwload today’s slides here:
Defining the scope of the course
• In 1871, Edward Tylor [1832 – 1917, English
anthropologist] wrote that culture is:
• “that complex whole which includes
knowledge, belief, art, morals, law,
custom, and any other capabilities and
habits acquired by man as a member of
society.”
We will consider:
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objects
actions
mental representations
institutional structures
Grading
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25%
reading quizzes
35%
mid-term exam
40%
final exam
–––––––––––––––––––––––––
100%
Your total grade
Study Tools
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Backup (Dropbox/Cloud + hard drive)
Zotero: bibliography
Diigo: annotate online reading
Practice active reading
Today’s class
• Our questions:
– What is culture?
– Why does it matter?
– What is a sign?
– What is the relationship between signs /
meaning / action?
Ferdinand de Saussure
Swiss linguist, 1857-1913
• Signified = Mental
concept of what the
signifier stands for, it
could be a concept,
object or emotion.
• Signifier = the
material aspect of it,
such as the image,
mark, sound, written
word etc.
René Magritte
(Belgian surrealist painter )
• The Treachery of
Images
• (French: La trahison
des images, 1928–
29)
• Notes on
• Raymond Williams. “Culture” in Keywords:
A Vocabulary of Culture and Society.
London: Fontana 1988.
Williams’ text: history of the word “culture”
• Cultivate
• civilization
• cultureS
Williams’ text concludes on 3
general meanings for “culture”
• process of intellectual / spiritual / aesthetic
development (18th century)
• a way of life, that unites
– a group of people
– a time period
• Hippie culture, counter culture
• a specialized body of work produced by
intellectuals and artists
– the latest one chronologically
– Ministry of culture
Reading
• William Sewell, Jr. 1999. “The Concept(s)
of Culture” pp. 35-61 in Victoria E. Bonnell and Lynn
Hunt (eds.), Beyond the Cultural Turn: New Directions in
the Study of Society and Culture (Berkeley: University of
California Press).
• Is culture useless as a concept?
The Turkish Bath
1862 painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique
INGRES.
Reading
• Howard S. Becker. 1986. “Culture: A
Sociological View” pp 11-24 in Doing Things Together:
Selected Papers. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University
Press.
• How is collective action created and
sustained?
• For Becker: culture is “one of the
resources people draw on in order to
coordinate their activities”.
• Sociologists study what holds groups of
people together
• For Becker: culture is “one of the
resources people draw on in order to
coordinate their activities”.
How does culture help us act
collectively?
• Culture gives us an understanding of how
things should be done
Next question: where does culture
come from?
For Becker, people create culture by
adapting to new conditions.
We are constantly engaged in meaningmaking.
Ann Swidler
• Important article:
Ann Swidler. “Culture in Action”. American
Sociological Review. Vol. 51, No. 2 (Apr., 1986),
pp. 273-286
Quote: “Culture influences action not by providing
the ultimate values toward which action is
oriented, but by shaping a repertoire or "tool kit"
of habits, skills, and styles from which people
construct "strategies of action”.”
Max WEBER
• The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of
Capitalism.
• The original German text was composed
in 1904 and 1905