Enculturation and Socialization

Objectives
At the end of the lesson we are able to:
1. Explain the development of one’s self and
others as a product of socialization and
enculturation
2. Identify the context, content, processes, and
consequences of enculturation and socialization
3. Identifies the social goals and the socially
acceptable means of achieving these goals
 Identity Formation
Through enculturation and socialization, an
individual learns the norms of his or her society.
The compilation of the values, attitudes, and
beliefs that individuals receive from their family,
peers, and community enables them to create a
personal identity that simultaneously separates
them from the other members of the group and
incorporates them in its system. Such
differentiation from the social template is called
individuation. This can be related to the concept
of personal identity.
• Social identity is a person’s notion of who he
or she is in society. This includes the roles and
statuses that he or she performs in accord to
what the society expects of him or her.
 Two Primary Types of Identity That An
Individual Takes On
1. Primary Identity – consists of the roles and
statuses that an individual learns as a child.
This includes the core social identities that
are often ascribed to an individual such as
sex, age, and ethnicity.
• As a child gets enculturated and socialized
with his or her society’s norm, he or she
participates in the construction of his or her
secondary identity. This includes roles and
statuses that are achieved such as occupation,
educational background, economic status, and
gender.
 Theories on Identity
There are Two (2) primary theories related to
the understanding of identity formation and
practice.
1. Role Learning Theory – promotes the
argument that individuals learn a repertoire of
social roles from the society. Roles constitute
the social facts (e.g., gender role, occupational
role, family role) that inhibit, empower, and
influence an individual’s action.
2. Theory on symbolic interactionism –
promotes the idea that individuals construct
their notion of the self through social
interactions performed within a society. This
implies that roles and their performances are
part of a creative process wherein the
individual sees the behavior of others and
responds to it by creating a role that it can
play.
 Norms and Values
The concept of cultural values refers to all
those ideas held in society that are considered
good, acceptable, and right. Cultural values
inform the types of aspirations that members
of society aspire for, and these are labeled as
social goals.
Using conflict theory, it can be said that these
values and goals are sometimes source of
conflict within a society, as individuals have
varying access and experiences relating to it.
For example, the values which center on
wealth acquisition and its accompanying
prestige and power are not held true by all
individuals in a society, as these values are
scarce and unattainable for some individuals.
Another perspective on values and goals is
from the functionalism theory, which argues
that values exist to create unity and harmony
within the structure and fulfil the needs of the
individuals.
For example, the values that Filipinos attach to
family promote tightly knit communities that
serve as support groups of individuals.
 Four Categories of Norms
1. Folkways are the socially approved behaviors
that have no moral underpinning. This
includes a variety of actions that constitute
acceptable or expected behavior drawn from
customs and convections.
For example, some societies (e.g., Americans)
consider it rude for a visitor to make slurping
sounds when consuming soup, whereas
others (e.g., Chinese) encourage it.
2. Mores are the norms related to moral
conventions. These include behaviors that are
considered acceptable in relation to religious
practices. The use of contraceptives, such as
condoms and birth control pills, is frowned
upon in highly religious societies, whereas it is
accepted, and even encouraged, in others that
do not strictly follow the conventional dictates
of religious doctrine
3. Taboos are behaviors that are absolutely
forbidden in a specific culture. Performance of
taboos are met with stricter punishments.
Examples of taboos are cannibalism and
incest.
4. Laws consist of rules and regulations that are
implemented by the state, making them the
prime source of social control. Violations of
laws are met with punishments, fines, and
imprisonment.
 Status and Role
Our form of social interaction are always
within the context of our status and that of
the people we are interacting with. This is to
say that we speak and behave differently
towards different sets of people. You have a
set of vocabularies and nonverbal cues that
you use for your parents, which you may not
use with your peers.
 Status and Role
Status is an individual’s position in which his
or her society, which carries with it a set of
defined rights and obligations.
Your status as a student comes with
obligations and rights, which are defined as
your roles.
Roles are the sets of expectation from the
people who occupy a particular status. From
the vocabulary that they would use to their
performance of their statuses, these are all
within the framework of roles.
The behavior of an individual within a social
space in accordance to his or her status is
called role performance.
• Multiplicity of roles within a given status is
called a role set.
 Conformity and Deviance
Conformity is the act of following the roles
and goals of one’s society. This behavior is
often met with rewards and acceptance form
other members of society.
Deviance is the act of violating the prescribed
social norms. Acts of deviance are often
associated with stigma. A stigma is a strong
sense of disapproval on nonconforming
behavior from members of society. When
deviance is within the context of legal
structures, it may even be considered a crime
or a violation of law.
• Conformity – individuals still accept cultural goals and try to achieve
them through culturally approved methods.
• Innovation – individuals still accept cultural goals but go about in
achieving it in a naturally disapproved way.
• Ritualism – individuals still live in society, and according to it
culturally approved ways, but no longer try to achieve cultural goals.
• Retreatism – Individuals no longer desire to achieve cultural goals,
and have abandoned the culturally approved ways of achieving
those goals.
• Rebellion – Individuals challenge the existing culturally accepted
goals by coming up with new ones, and the prescribed means in
achieving these goals.
 Social Control
To maintain social order and stability, social
control is needed.
Two elements that promote social control
1. Internalization is an integral part of
communicating and incorporating social
norms to an individual personality.
2. Sanctions are powerful in leading an
individual to conform to social norms.
 Four Types of Sunction
Formal Sanctions – These are the rewards or
forms of punishment that are formally
awarded by an institution such as a
government, a council, or an establishment.
Informal Sanctions these are the rewards and
forms of punishment that are spontaneously
given by an individual or a group of people as a
response to a behavior that was either
accepted or disapproved.
• Positive sanctions – These are actions or
statements that reward a particular behavior,
which reinforce its repetition.
 Formal Positive Formal Negative Informal Positive Informal Negative
Definition A reward given A punishment A reward given by A punishment given
by an institution given by an an given by an
to encourage institution to individual/group individual/group to
conformity enforce that encourage coerce conformity
conformity conformity
Examples 1. Recognition 1. Imprisonment 1. Standing 1. Gossip about a
of honors in for a crime Ovation from bad behavior
a learning committed the
facility viewers/attend
2. Medal of 2. Payment of ees
honor for fines for 2. An affirmative
2. Ridicule from
outstanding offenses nod from a peers
conduct in committed superior
government
service
3. Promotion in 3. Being fired 3. Cheers from 3. Being grounded
the from the teammates for by a parent
workplace workplace for scoring a shot
for excellent unsatisfactory
performance service