Culture and Socialization
Learning to be Human

Understanding Cause & Effect
• Correlation - the existence of a regular relationship between two sets of occurrences or variables. • Causation - a relationship in which one event or situation brings about the other. • Correlation does not imply causation. But a causal relationship must mean that two variables are correlated.

Sociological Imagination
• The more we understand what is happening in the world, the more frustrated we often become, for our knowledge leads to feelings of powerlessness. We feel that we are living in a world in which the citizen has become a mere spectator or a forced actor, and that our personal experience is politically useless and our political will a minor illusion (Mills 1959) Macro argument.

Chapter 3 Culture & Society

The Concepts of Culture
 Culture - The values the members of a given group hold, the norms they follow, and the material goods they create.  Values - abstract ideals. For example, monogamy is a prominent value in most Western societies.  Norms - definite principles or rules people are expected to observe  Society - a system of relationships that connects individuals who share the same culture.

The Concepts of Culture
 Culture and society are closely related. Cultural variations among humans are linked to different types of society.  No culture could exist without a society; equally, no society could exist without culture.

The Concepts of Culture
 Ethnocentrism – judging other cultures in the terms/standard of one’s own culture  Cultural relativism- judging a society by its own standards  Countercultures –groups that largely reject the prevailing norms of society (Anarchists)  Subculture- smaller segments of society distinguished by unique patterns of behavior (Harley-Davidson owners)

Nature or Nurture?
• Biologists and some psychologists emphasize