Understanding

Culture, Society and

Politics
Mrs. Jessa C. Encinareal
 Objectives:
At the end of the lesson, you will be able to:
✓ Explain the relationship between biology
and culture
✓ Identify the need for socialization in the
development of one’s self
✓ Apply the concepts of socialization,
conformity, and deviance in understanding
the structure and function of groups in
society.
Enculturation
and
Socialization
 Socialization
•It refers to a lifelong social experience
by which people develop their human
potential and learn culture
 Enculturation
•The process by which people learn the
requirements of their surrounding culture
and acquire the values and behaviors
appropriate or necessary in that culture
Three Goals of Socialization
•It teaches impulse control and help
individuals develop a conscience
•It teaches individuals how to
prepare for and perform certain
social roles

•It cultivates shared

sources of meaning
and value
Mead and the Development
of the Social Mind ( SELF )
•The “self” is the
sociological
concept
 Feral Child
•children who, through either
accident or deliberate isolation,
have grown up with limited
human contact.
 George Herbert Mead
•He is well- known for
his theory of the social
self, which is based on
the central argument
that the self is a social
emergent.
•Language allows individuals to
take on the “role of the other”
and allows people to respond to
his or her own gestures in terms
of the symbolized attitudes of
others.
•During play, individuals take on
the roles of other people and
pretend to be those other
people in order to express the
expectations of significant
others.
•In the game, the individual is
required to internalize the roles
of all others who are involved
with him or her in the game
and must comprehend the rules
of the game.
 Pragmatism:
•First, the true reality does not
exist “ out there” in the real
world, it “is actively created as
we act in and toward the
world”.
 Pragmatism:
•Second, people remember and
base their knowledge of the
world on what has been useful
to them and are likely to
forget “ what no longer works”
 Pragmatism:
•Third, people define the social
and physical “objects” they
encounter in the world
according to their use for them.
 Pragmatism:
•Lastly, if we want to
understand actors, we must
base that understanding on
what people actually do.
 “I” and the “ME”
➢The “me” represents the
expectations and attitudes of
others.
➢The “I” is the response to the
“me”, or the person’s individuality.
 Identity Formation
•The development of an
individual’s distinct personality,
which is regarded as a persisting
entity in a particular stage of life
by which person is recognize
 Self Concept
•The sum of being’s knowledge and
understanding of his/ herself.
•Components:
•Physical
•Psychological
•Social attributes
 Cultural Identity
•Is one’s feeling of identity or
affiliation with a group or
culture.
 Ethnic Identity
•The identification with a certain
ethnicity usually on the basis of
presumed common genealogy or
ancestry.
 National Identity
•Is an ethical and
philosophical concept
whereby all humans divided
into groups called nation.
 Religious Identity
•Is the set of beliefs and
practices generally held by an
individual involving adherence
to codified beliefs and rituals.
 Status and Roles
•Are important concept in socialization
because the behavior of young
members of society are controlled by
assigning them certain status which
they will enact.
 Status
•Position in a social system
•Refers to a social position that a
person holds
•Can be ascribed or achieved
respectively
 Ascribed Status
•A social position receives at birth
or takes on involuntary later in
life.
 Achieved Status
•Social position a person takes
on voluntarily that reflects
personal identity and effort
 Role
•Refers to the behavior expected
of someone who holds a
particular status
•A person who holds a status and
perform a role
 Role Strain
•Conflict among the roles
connected to two or more
statuses.
Social
Groups
“NO MAN IS AN
ISLAND”
- JOHN DONNE
 GROUP
•It is a collection of people
interacting together in orderly
way on the basis of shared
expectations about one’s
behavior.
•It can pertain to a social aggregate
or collection of people who just who can
be in one place at the same time.

E.g. people queuing at the MRT station or

passengers of a public vehicle.
•May also be used to refer to a social
category. – Individuals classified
together because they share a certain
characteristics.

E.g. educated, poor, homeless, being man,

and woman
 Four ways to identify social groups
according to Gelles and Lavine (1999)

1. Members of the group have shared

identity.
2. Members of a social group interact
regularly.
3. Social groups have social structure.
4. Social groups depends on consensus.
 Types of Groups
1.According to the nature of
social ties.
✓Primary
✓Secondary
 Primary Groups
➢Coined by Horton Cooley to
describe a small, warm association
based on ongoing personal, intimate
relationships.

Ex. Family, barkada

 Secondary Groups
➢Groups of people who are not
related or emotionally connected,
yet work together to achieve a
common interest, purpose or goal

Ex. Study groups, attorney-client

 Types of Groups
1.According to social
identification
✓In-groups
✓Out-groups
✓Reference
 In-groups
➢a social group that a person identifies
as being a part of, based on factors
like nationality, race, religion,
socioeconomic status, or political
affiliation.
 Out-groups
➢a social group that a person does not
identify with, based on similar factors
as would cause that person to identify
with an in-group
 Reference
➢a social group that an individual uses
as a standard of comparison or point
of reference in making evaluations
and decisions.
 Types of Groups
1.According to organization.
✓Formal organization
✓Informal organization
 Formal Organization
➢a type of group which is deliberately
constructed and whose members are
organized to achieve a specific goal.
 Informal Organization
➢the social structure of an
organization.
➢Informal organizations form when
individuals willingly come together
due to a common interest and
identity.
Conformity
and
Deviance
 Conformity
Is the desire to go along with the
norms of a group of people, so you
will be accepted as an in- group
person
 Deviance
Departing from usual or
accepted standards , especially
in social or sexual behavior
 Deviance
1. Cesare Lombroso- anthropological
criminology
2. John Bowlby- Psychological theory
3. Émile Durkheim- Functional theory
of deviance
4. Albert Cohen- status frustration
theory
Deviance and the Social
Paradigms Basic assumptions Basis of Interpretation

Structural Deviance promotes Deviance performs

unity, serves as a important functions in
Functionalism moral compass, and the over all
provides opportunities operations of society
where there are none
Paradigms Basic assumptions Basis of Interpretation

Historical Deviance is a result of unequal Is a form of civic

distribution of social desirables action. It aims to
Conflict and life chances rectify the unfair
and unjust
syndromes of social
inequality
Critical Is a result of the exercise of We are helping
power. Symbols and ideas are these entities
Interpretivism
manipulated by powerful maintain their
people in the society in order to privileged positions
protect their economic and in society
political interest
Structural Strain Theory
Robert Merton
✓Offered a “ side-by-side”
formulation of conformity
and deviance
✓He developed the
structural strain theory
 Conformists
A person who conforms
to accepted behavior or
established practices.
 Innovators
Are those individuals that
accept the cultural goals of
society but reject the
conventional methods of
attaining those goals
 Ritualist
A person who do not believe in
the established cultural goals of
society, but they do believe in and
abide by the means for attaining
those goals.
 Retreatists
Who reject both the
cultural goals and the
accepted means of
attaining those goals
 Rebels
They substitute new goals
and new means of attaining
these goals.
 Labeling Theory
George Herbert Mead

- States that individuals become

deviants as a result of the labels
imposed on them by society
Social Control Theory
Travis Hirschi

-Argues that individuals will

engage in criminal or deviant
behavior if they are not controlled.