Download Soc 1000 Chapter 5 Summer Lecture Notes

Culture, Media, and Communication
Chapter 5
Eric Klineberg
with David Wachsmuth
THE BIG QUESTIONS
• What is culture?
• How does culture shape our collective
identify?
• How do our cultural practices relate to
class and status?
• Who produces culture, and why?
• What is the relationship between media
and democracy?
QUESTION 1
What is culture?
The Many Meanings of Culture
• 18th and 19th century: Rise of world travel and
exposure to world created differences
• End of 19th century: Anthropologists viewed
difference between groups of people as learned
and biological
• Early 20th century: Culture defined as entire way
of life of a people
• Today: Culture is a system and culture is a
practice
Culture as a System
Collective rituals we display in our cultural
events, such as this cockfight in modern
Indonesia, can demonstrate shared values
• What are some collective symbols of
contemporary U.S. culture?
• What cultural events could reveal shared
American values?
How Is Culture Actually Practiced?
Pierre Bourdieu
• People develop certain sets of assumptions
about the world and their place in it
• Kinds of habits depend upon upbringing
• Future choices and opinions always guided by
past experiences
Culture and Communication
In what way is culture a form of communication?
Language
• Cultural universal and cultural trait common to all
humans
• Fundamental building block of thought
• Provider of many cultural symbols and practices
Language influences culture but does not
completely determine it!
Mass Communication
Mass communication
• Internet creates new
set of communication
possibilities
• Social networks and
media
• Instant messaging
THE FACEBOOK EXPLOSION
Mass self-communication
• Internet-centered communication
How is this related to the digital divide discussed in your text ?
QUESTION 2
How does culture shape our collective
identity?
Mainstream Cultures, Subcultures, and Countercultures
What distinguishes a subculture from the mainstream?
• Mainstream cultures
• Subcultures
• Countercultures
• Hegemony
Countercultures such as punks use their appearance and
behaviors to deliberately set themselves off from
mainstream culture
What are other examples of contemporary resistance
through rituals?
United States: Hegemony, Culture Wars, or
Multiculturalism?
How is the concept of culture wars at odds
with the multicultural landscape of the United
States?
• Cultural wars: Arguments over proper role of
family and religious values of state policy (i.e.,
abortion rights, immigration rights, gay rights)
• Multiculturalism: Beliefs or policies promoting
equal accommodation of different ethnic or
cultural groups within a society
The Melting Pot Metaphor
Immigrants come to the United States from all sorts of
national, ethnic, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds
Melting pot metaphor
• Privileges a specific notion of what it means to be
American
• Serves as an example of ethnocentrism
Cultural relativism
• Provides alternative to melting pot metaphor
• Evaluates cultural meanings and practices in their own
social context
Why is it important for sociologists studying immigration to
practice cultural relativism?
Global Cultures
What produces and reproduces global and
national cultures, and what effects do they have?
Global cultures
• Incorporate cultural practices common to large parts
of world
• Best conceptualized not as a single thing but as a
set of flows: some ideas, people, and commodities
circulate smoothly, and others do not
National Cultures
Nationalism
• Nations are imagined communities
• National communities arose with origination of print
capitalism
• Many important social, political, economic, and
cultural institutions are organized along national
lines
• Systematic effects found in life choices, attitudes
and worldviews
In the Beginning
Early childhood education
• Many cultural assumptions formed during early
years
• Preschool reflects national culture and
reproduces it
• Preschools follow very different educational
approaches in different countries
Why is preschool an important place to study
national cultural differences?
QUESTION 3
How do our cultural practices related to
class and status?
Cultural Capital
What is cultural capital, and in what ways have
American elites become cultural omnivores?
Bourdieu/Cultural capital
• Includes education, attitudes, and networks
• Involves scarcity
Cultural omnivores
• Demonstrate high status through cultural
consumption
Symbolic Boundaries
Symbolic boundaries may or may not
overlap
These include such things as:
• Taste
• Socioeconomic status
• Morality
• Geographic location
• Spatial boundaries
Class Reproduction
Class is reproduced not only through the money you
have but through the culture you practice
Short-term class reproduction
• Everyday interactions confirm relative statuses
Long-term class reproduction
• Advantages associated with wealth
• Childrearing patterns
(i.e., concerted cultivation; accomplishment of
natural growth)
QUESTION 4
What is the relationship between media and
democracy?
Media Bias: Domination or Framing?
Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky
• Media dominance argument
• “Propaganda model” of media
Contemporary sociologist
• Media framing argument
Culture Online and Offline
How does the relationship between the media and
democracy look different in an age of corporate
media consolidation and the Internet?
• Less responsiveness to local communities
• Internet activism
An example
• Massive protests swept through the Middle East with
people gathering in Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt to
overthrow the Mubarak Regime
• How did social media played an important role in
allowing these protests to be organized and spread?