Sociology: Culture Study Guide

What does it mean to live in a pluralistic society?

(diverse) where the people in it believe all kinds of different things and tolerate each other's beliefs even when they don't match their own.

What are values, and why are they important?

A person's values are the things that are important to them. Knowing what they are is helpful for us in selling, by understanding the criteria that they use when making decisions.

How are ascribed and achieved status different?

An ascribed status is a position in a social group that one is born into or have no control over. This is different from achieved status, which a person earns based on their choices or their efforts

How do ideals of beauty change across place and time?

Beauty standards are so all-pervasive—in movies, TV, magazines, and advertising—that we take them for granted. And lots of us go through the world assuming that "beautiful" means what our culture says it does: smooth, symmetrical, clean, thin, traditionally feminine, delicate and young

What are cultural universals, and why do they apply to all cultures?

Cultural universals (elements of a culture that exist in every society such as food, religion, language) exist because all cultures have basic needs and they alldevelop common features to ensure their needs are met

What is the difference between an ethnic and a racial group?

Ethnic Group: associated with culture Racial Group: associated with biology

Describe the difference between responding to cultural differences with ethnocentrism versus with cultural relativism.

Ethnocentrism: addresses foreign peoples from the standpoint of the superiority of the observer's culture, including values, religion, and symbols Cultural Relativism: addresses other people in light of those people's culture

What are the types of norms and what are the differences among them?

Folkways: aka "conventions" or "customs,". Standards of behavior that are socially approved but not morally significant Mores: norms of morality Taboos: certain behaviors that a culture absolutely forbids Laws: a formal body of rules enacted by the state and backed by the power of the state

Why is Milgram's Obedience Experiment a cultural study?

He conducted an experiment focusing on the conflict between obedience to authority and personal conscience. Milgram examined justifications for acts of genocide offered by those accused at the World War II, Nuremberg War Criminal trials.

What is the difference between popular and high culture?

High Culture: the consumption patterns, mannerisms, beliefs, amusement, leisure activities, and tastes and preferences of a societies elite Popular Culture: (same as high culture) for the mass of society

What is the difference between material and non-material culture?

Material Culture: refers to the physical objects, resources, and spaces that people use to define their culture Non-Material Culture: refers to the nonphysical ideas that people have about their culture including beliefs, values, rules, norms, morals, language, organizations, and institutions

Identify and describe the types of sanctions?

Positive: rewards Negative: punishments Formal: actions that are legalized and official in nature and enforced by an authoritative force. Informal: may include shame, ridicule, sarcasm, criticism, and disapproval

What is the difference between realistic and ideal culture?

Realistic Culture: includes the values and norms that are actually followed by a culture. Ideal Culture: includes the values and norms that a culture claims to have

What is the difference between a subculture and a counterculture?

Subcultures include people who may accept much of the dominant culture but are set apart from it by one or more culturally significant characteristics. On the other hand, countercultures are groups of people who differ in certain ways from the dominant culture and whose norms and values may be incompatible with it.

Why is fundamental attribution an "error"?

The fundamental attribution error is our tendency to explain someone's behavior based on internal factors, like personality or disposition, and to underestimate the influence that external factors, like situational influences, have on another person's behavior. The opposite is true when we explain our own behavior

What is the relationship among food and people's religion, location, and socioeconomic status?

The relationship between low socio-economic status and poor health is complicated and is influenced by gender, age, culture, environment, social and community networks, individual lifestyle factors and health behaviours

What are examples of cultural lag?

The situation in which technological advancements or changes in society occur faster than the changes in the rules and norms of the culture that go along with those advancements or changes - School Calendars - Cancer vaccines - Pregnancy life support - Childhood development

How do symbolic interactionism, functionalism, and conflict theory interpret cultural norms?

These perspectives offer sociologists theoretical paradigms for explaining how society influences people, and vice versa. Each perspective uniquely conceptualizes society, social forces, and human behavior

How do Neocolonialism and Cultural Hegemony contribute to the process of cultural leveling?

Through neocolonialism, the more technologically advanced nations ensure their involvement with low income nations, such that this relationship practically annihilates the potential for the development of the smaller states and contributes to the capital gain of the technologically advanced nations. Cultural hegemony' that can result from the unequal distribution of power and privilege in global society. The name that is given to awareness of social inequality is 'critical consciousness'.

Why do people experience cultural shock?

caused when a person moves to a cultural environment which is different from one's own. It is also the personal disorientation a person may feel when experiencing an unfamiliar way of life due to immigration or a visit to a new country (a move between social environments)

What does it mean to make the "strange familiar and the familiar strange"? Why is it important for a sociologist to do this?

making the familiar strange" occurs when we seek to find new uses for something -- an object or human agency like a student organization or local environmental group -- whose function we generally take for granted. Making the strange familiar and the familiar strange," is not one we often hear, it is relevant to situations affecting human creativity, where the objective is to motivate people to a different approach interpreting things or solving problems.

Describe value contradictions

values that oppose each other; to follow one means to come in conflict with another.

Describe value clusters

values that together form a larger whole. Ex: values for hard work, education and individualism all combine to create the value of success