SOCI 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Pluralistic Ignorance, Sensemaking, Ethnocentrism
MONDAY
Culture
Metaphor
● Us = fish
● Culture = water
○ Keeps us alive
○ We cannot necessarily see it?
● How does culture keep us alive?
○ Taught us where it is safe to walk
○ Teaches drivers where to drive
○ Tells us what to eat
○ Which side of the road to walk on
Culture: a complex system of meaning and behavior that make up a way of life for a given
group
● Sense-making (naming and meaning)
Macro and/or micro
● Micro
○ Friend groups
○ Class
Material or nonmaterial
● Material
○ Desks
● Nonmaterial
○ Language
○ Gestures
○ Symbolism
Objects and subjects of culture
● Culture tells us how to act, view the world (treats us as an object)
● We then recreate the culture
Culture as a toolbox
● Useful knowledge to fix/make sense of thigns
○ Passed on for generations
The idea of cultural transmission (video)
● Across generations
● Humans are more advanced
● Gives us a taken-for-granted sense of reality
○ Thomas dictum,
■ What we believe to be true is true and its consequences
○ pluralistic ignorance
■ Where everyone in the room knows the truth but we act like we don’t
● Ethnocentrism
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