Symbols, Values

and Norms
Putu Nomy Yasintha, S.Sos, MPA
[email protected]
082146556257
 Culture
▪ Culture is the way that non-material objects –
like thoughts, action, language, and values –
come together with material objects to form a
way of life.

▪ So you can basically break culture down into

two main components: things and ideas.

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Culture of things Culture of Ideas

When you’re crossing If you grew up in a country where

the road, you can see cars drive on the right side of the

markers of your culture road, your parents probably taught

you to look left first before crossing.
in the things around you
This is non-material culture, the
– the street signs, the
culture of ideas. Its made up of the
width of the road, the intangible creation of human society
speed and style of the – values, symbols, customs, ideals.
cars. This is material Instead of the Statue of Liberty, it’s

culture, the culture of the idea of liberty and what it means

things. to be free.

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Symbol
Symbols include anything that carries a specific meaning that’s recognized by people who
share a culture. Like a stop sign, or a gesture. Non-verbal gesture like this are a form of
language, which is itself a symbolic system that people within a culture can use to communicate.
Language is more than just the words you speak or write – and its not just a matter of English or
French or Arabic. The type of language you use in one cultural setting may be entirely different
than what you’d use in another. Take how you talk to people online. New linguistic styles have
sprung up that convey meaning to other people online, because internet culture. If you’re internet
fluent, me saying ‘because’ and then a noun makes perfect sense, as a way of glossing over a
complicated explanation. But if you’re not familiar with that particular language, it just seems
like bad grammar. Whether it’s written, spoken or non-verbal, language allows us to share the
things that make up our culture, a process known as cultural transmission.

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“  the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, argues that a person’s
thoughts and actions are influenced by the cultural lens
created by the language they speak.

 Sociology is an evolving field, and academic disagreements

like this are just one reason that we study language and how
it shapes our society. But if language helps us communicate,
shape and pass on culture, the next elements of culture is
what helps us organize culture into moral categories.

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Values
Values are the cultural
standards that people use to
decide what’s good or bad,
what’s right or wrong. They
serve as the ideals and
guidelines that we live by.

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 Different
cultures have a
different values,
Beliefs, by contrast, are more explicit than values –
and these
beliefs are specific ideas about what people think is true values can help
about the world. explain why we

So for example, an American value is democracy, while see different

social structures
a common belief is that a good political system is one
around the
where everyone has the opportunity to vote. world.

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“  Cultural values and beliefs can also help form the
guidelines for behavior within that culture. These
guidelines are what we call norms, or the rules and
expectations that guide behaviour within a society. So
giving up your seat for an elderly person? Great.
Picking your nose in public? Gross. These are two ways
of talking about norms. A norm simply relates to what
we think is “normal”, whether something is either
culturally accepted, or not.

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Three main types of
norms.:
Folkways:
the informal little rules that kind of go without saying. It’s not illegal to
violate a folkway, but if you do, there might be ramifications – or what
we call negative sanctions. Like, if you walk onto an elevator and stand
facing the back wall instead of the door. You won’t get in trouble, but
other people are going to give you some weird looks. And sometimes,
breaking a folkway can be a good thing, and score you some positive
sanctions from certain parts of society. Like, your mom might ground
you for getting a lip ring, but your friends might think it’s really cool.

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Mores:
more official than folkways and tend to be codified, or formalized, as the stated rules
and laws of society. When mores are broken, you almost always get a negative
sanction – and they’re usually more severe than just strange looks. Standing
backward in the elevator might make you the office weirdo, but you’ll probably get
fired id you come into work topless, because there are strict rules about what kinds of
clothing – or lack thereof – are appropriate for the workplace. But mores aren’t
universal. You may get fired for showing up without a shirt at work, but men can lay
on the beach shirtless, or walk down the street with no problem. For women, these
norms are different. In US, cultural norms about women’s bodies and sexuality mean
that its illegal for women to go topless in public. But then in part of Europe, social
norms are more lax about nudity, and it’s not uncommon for women to also be
shirtless at the beach. 11
Taboo:
the norms that are crucial to a society’s moral center, involving behaviors that are
always negatively sanctioned. Taboo behaviors are never okay, no matter the
circumstance, and they violate your very sense of decency. So killing a person: taboo
or not? Your first instinct might to be say, yes, killing is awful. But, while most
cultures agree that life is sacred, and murder should be illegal, it’s not always
considered wrong. Cannibalism, incest, and child molestation are common examples
of behavior we see as taboo. Yes, you can kill someone in self-defense, but if you pull
a Hannibal Lector and eat that person, you’re going to jail, whether it started as self-
defence or not.

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▪ Norms like these and many others help societies function well, but norms can also
be a kind of constraint, a social control that holds people back. Some norms can be
bad, like ones that encourage unhealthy behavior like smoking or binge drinking.
But not all norms have clearly defined moral distinctions – like the way a culture’s
emphasis on competition pushes people toward success, but also discourages
cooperation. And that’s the tricky thing about culture. Most of the time you don’t
notice the cultural forces that are shaping your thoughts and actions, because they
just seem normal.

▪ That’s why sociologists study culture. We can’t notice whether our values and our
norms are good or bad unless we step back and look at them with the analytical eye
of a sociologist.

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Thank You
If you have any questions
You can find me at
▪ Via WA dm
▪ [email protected]

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