| A | B |
|---|
| What country is the most multicultural of all the world's nations? | The United States |
| FACT | The United States has great cultural diversity because of the long history of receiving immigrants. |
| nonmaterial culture | ideas created by members of society |
| material culture | physical things in culture from armchairs to zippers |
| FACT | society and culture cannot exist without the other |
| FACT | The US and Japan have cultures that stress achievement and hard work, but US values individualism and Japan values collective harmony |
| FACT | only humans rely on culture rather than instict to ensure their survival |
| FACT | after dinosaurs disappeared; the apperance of primates made a crucial turn in our history |
| primates | the largest brains relative to body size of all living creatures |
| homo sapiens | Latin for intelligent person |
| FACT | when homo sapiens evolved so did culture...it evolved rapidly |
| What are the 4 ELEMENTS OF CULTURE | language, symbols, values and norms |
| Language | more than 200 languages spoken in this country, and globally 7,000 languages documented |
| Langage FACT | lanuages are declining around the world |
| Why are languages declining? | technology communication, international migration; basically global cultural diversity is being reduced |
| Symbols | society creates symbols all the time; recently there is all the text messaging symbols |
| FACT | we take for granted how much symbolism is part of culture: American Flag, cyber symbols like LOL, if you don't know or understand symbols you are feeling lost in culture |
| culture shock | example is if someone is for US and has a pet at home, and then you visit Indonesia and they roast dogs for dinner |
| another culture shock example | you go to Indian restaurant and ask for cheeseburger and they are offended because they think cows are sacred and you are eating one |
| MORE ON LANGUAGE | it is a system of symbols that let people communicate with one another |
| Language fact | it is believed that people who speak Indian for examples experience the world differently than people who speak in English or Spanish |
| Sapir-Whorf thesis | people don't agree with their thoughts because children understand the meaning of amily before they learn the word "family" |
| values | people who share a culture use to make choices about how to live |
| FACT | values are broad pirnciples that underlie beliefs |
| Sociologist Robin Williams identified 10 values as central to our way of life | 1. equal opportunity 2. individual achievement and personal success 3. material comfort 4. activity and work 5. practical and efficient 6. progress 7. science 8. democracy 9. freedom 10. racism and group superiority |
| CHANGES IN AMERICAN VALUES | US people used to value hard work, and now they value leisure more |
| FACT | values are different in higher income and lower income countries |
| Lower income nations | they value survival; emphasis on physical safety and economic security |
| Lower income nations | they worry about not having enough to eat or safe place to sleep |
| Lower income nations | traditional; importance is family and religion, and don't believe in divorce and abortion |
| Higher income nations | value individualism and self expression |
| Higher income nations | focus is finding personal happiness, women are more = to men, and divorce and abortion are supported |
| William Sumner | he is a sociologist in the US who came up with the word "mores" to mean norms that have moral significance like it is society's inisistence that adults don't have sex with children |
| folkways | this is going against a norm of routine like a man not wearing a tie for a formal dinner party---it may raise an eyebrow but if he was naked and only had a tie on that is a breaking a more norm |
