Module 3

Anthropology Culture
- Inclusive study of human race, culture & society, and - Complex whole which included knowledge, beliefs, arts,
physical development morals, law, customs, and any other capabilities and habits
a. Race acquired by a human as member of society (Sir Edward B.
- idea that people can be divided into different Taylor, founder of cultural anthropology)
groups - As dynamic as to how humanity would want it to be
- based on physical characteristics that they are - Significant factor in continuity of society
perceived to share (skin color, eye shape, etc.) or - Distinguishes communal group from another
the dividing of people in this way - Develops behavioral foundation of social self
b. Culture
Social Self
- Set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and
practices - Can be traced from how we were raised In society (beliefs,
c. Society traditions, ideas, perspectives, and changes)
- People who live in a definable community and
Social Personality
share culture
d. Physical Development - Reflection of culture
- Significant in humanity’s self-understanding - Significant in understanding individuals and ground work of
- As we grow up, we adjust to culture to benefits society
us (we fine tune and modify it to needs and - Builds its structures and unites them
wants)
Self
a. Separate
- Distinct from other selves
- Unique and has its own identity
b. Self-contained (complete) and Independent (free from
outside control, independent from authority)
- In itself it can exist
- Distinctness allows its own thoughts, characteristics,
and volition (power of using ones’ will)
- Does not require any other self to exist
c. Consistent
- has personality that’s enduring (can be expected to
persist for quite some time)
- allows self to be studies, describes, and measured
- allows means that self’s traits, characteristics,
tendencies, and potentialities are more or less the
same
d. Unitary
- Self is center of all experiences and thoughts
e. Private
- Sorts out information, feelings, emotions, and
thought processes within self
- Process is never accessible to anyone but self
Anthropology
- Understand culture as dynamic and evolving socially
constructed reality that exits in the minds of the social
group members
- What they make
Sociology - those who develop and eventually grow to become
adults who still did not learn simple matters like basic
- study of human life, social groups, whole societies, and
manners of conduct failed in internalizing due to
human world
parental or familial failure to initiate them into the
- Subject matter is our behavior as social beings in
world.
relationship with other people
- without a family, person may not even survive or
A. Social Constructivism
become a human person (who he is because of his
- Self should not be seen as static entity that stays
family for the most part)
constant
F. Gender & Self
- Self has to be seen as unceasing flux (in constant
- gender is one those loci of the self that is subject to
struggle with external reality and malleable in
alteration, change, and development
dealing with society)
- society forces a particular identity unto us depending
B. Self & Culture
on our sex and/or gender
- Marcel Mauss
- slight modifications have been on the way due to
- Self has two faces:
feminism and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender
a. Personne
(lgbt) activism
- Composed of social concepts of what it means
- because mothers take the role of taking care of
to be who they are
children, there is a tendency for girls to imitate the
- What it means to live in particular institution,
same and reproduce the same kind of mentality of
family, religion, and nationality
women as care providers in the family (reinforces the
- how to behave given expectation and
notion of what roles they should take and the selves
influences from others
they should develop) (Nancy Chodorow)
b. Moi
- gendered self is then shaped within a particular
- Sense of who they are, body, basic identity, and
context of time and space
biological givenness
- sense of the self that is being taught makes sure that
- Basic identity
an individual fits in a particular environment
C. Self & Language
- this is dangerous and detrimental in the goal of truly
- If born in culture, they try to fit in mold
finding one’s self, self-determination, and growth of
- If self is born in culture, adjust according to exposure
the self. gender has to be personally discovered and
D. Self & Development of Social World
asserted and not dictated by culture and the society.
- People in growth and development engage actively in
shaping self
- Unending terrain of metamorphosis of self is
mediated by language
- Language as both publicly shared and privately
utilized symbol system is the site where the
individual and social make and remake each other
(SCHWARTZ, WHITE, AND LUTZ)
E. Self in Families
- Sociologists focus on different institutions and
powers at play in society (e.a. family)
- born givenness, disposition from his parents’ gene
and general condition of life, the impact of one’s
family is still deemed as a given in understanding the
self
- the kind of family that we are born in, the resources
available to us (human, spiritual, economic), and the
kind of development that we will have will affect us
- learning is critical in our capacity to actualize our
potential of becoming humans (human persons learn
the ways of living and therefore their selfhood by
being in a family)
- it is what a family initiates a person to become that
serves as the basis for this person’s progress
- babies internalize ways and styles that they observe
from their families (imitating language)
- behaviors and attitudes maybe indirectly taught
through rewards and punishments
- others (sexual behavior or how to confront emotions)
are learned through subtle means (tone of the voice
or intonation of the models)