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CULTURE (continued):Beliefs, Norms, Cultural Diversity

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Introduction to Sociology ­ SOC101
VU
Lesson 10
CULTURE (continued)
Values: Culturally defined standards of desirability, goodness, and beauty that serve as broad guidelines for
social living. What ought to be.
Examples of values: Equal opportunity, Achievement or success, Material comfort, Activity and work.
Science, Freedom, Physical fitness, Health, Punctuality. Wealth, Education, Competition and Merit.
Honesty, Dignity of labor, Patriotism. Justice and Democracy. Environmental protection, Charity and
Development.
Sometimes there could be inconsistency in the values which can lead to conflict.
Beliefs: Specific statements that people hold to be true. Values are broad principles that underlie beliefs.
Values are abstract standard of goodness, while beliefs are particular matters that individuals consider to be
true or false.
Norms: Rules and expectations by which a society guides the behavior of its members. These are the
shared expectations of the people that govern their behavior.
Proscriptive norms: Mandating what we should not do. Forbidding from certain actions.
Prescriptive norms: What we should do.
Mores and Folkways: W. G. Sumner gave these concepts.
Mores (MORE-ays): Society's standards of proper moral conduct. Such standards have been considered as
essential to maintaining a way of life. These are the notions of right or wrong developed by society.
Violation of mores brings a strong reaction from others.
Folkways: Society's customs for routine, casual interaction. These are of less moral significance. Examples
can be: proper dress, appropriate greetings, and common courtesy. People usually ignore the violation of
folkways.
"Ideal" culture and "Real" Culture
Ideal culture: Social patterns that are mandated by cultural values and norms. The ideal values and norms,
which are prevalent in the society.
Real culture: Actual social patterns those only approximate cultural expectations. The norms and value that
people actually follow. It can also be how many people follow these cultural patterns. Or how much a
person observes a cultural pattern. Since this can be explained in numbers therefore it may also be called a
statistical norm.
Material and Non-Material Culture
Tangible and intangible culture as explained earlier.
Cultural Diversity
There are many ways of life; hence there are differences in culture. In one society there could be
differences in patterns of marriage and family, patterns of education, patterns of worship, and patterns of
earning a living. One finds cultural difference within the province and across the provinces in Pakistan.
Countries like Canada, which are inhabited by immigrants, display a big cultural diversity. People have
migrated from all over the globe to Canada and brought cultural differences with them and in many cases
are trying to continue with them.
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Table of Contents:
  1. THE ORIGINS OF SOCIOLOGY:Auguste Comte, The Fields of Sociology
  2. THE SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE:Society affects what we do
  3. THEORETICAL PARADIGMS:Salient Paradigms, Critical Evaluation
  4. SOCIOLOGY AS SCIENCE:Empirical, Verifiable, Cumulative, Self-Correcting
  5. STEPS IN SOCIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION:Exploration/Consultation
  6. SOCIAL INTERACTION:Social Status, ROLE, The Social Construction of Reality
  7. SOCIAL GROUPS:Primary and Secondary Groups, Reference Group, Networks
  8. ORGANIZATIONS:Utilitarian Organizations, Coercive Organizations
  9. CULTURE:Universality, Components of Culture, Symbols, Language
  10. CULTURE (continued):Beliefs, Norms, Cultural Diversity
  11. CULTURE (continued):Culture by social class, Multiculturalism, Cultural Lag
  12. SOCIALIZATION: HUMAN DEVELOPMENT, NATURE, Social Isolation
  13. UNDERSTANDING THE SOCIALIZATION PROCESS
  14. AGENTS OF SOCIALIZATION:The Family, The School, Peer Groups, The Mass Media
  15. SOCIALIZATION AND THE LIFE COURSE:CHILDHOOD, ADOLESCENCE
  16. SOCIAL CONTROL AND DEVIANCE:Crime, Deviants, Stigma, Labeling
  17. THE SOCIAL FOUNDATIONS OF DEVIANCE:Cultural relativity of deviance
  18. EXPLANATIONS OF CRIME:Sociological explanations
  19. EXPLANATIONS OF CRIME -- CONTINUED:White-Collar Crime, Conflict Theory
  20. SOCIAL DISTRIBUTION OF CRIME: EXPLANATIONS, Gender and Crime
  21. SOCIAL STRATIFICATION: INTRODUCTION AND SIGNIFICANCE
  22. THEORIES OF CLASS AND STRATIFICATION – I:Critical evaluation
  23. THEORIES OF SOCIAL CLASS AND STRATIFICATION – II
  24. THEORIES OF CLASS AND SOCIAL STRATIFICATION – III
  25. SOCIAL CLASS AS SUBCULTURE
  26. SOCIAL MOBILITY:Structural factors, Individual factors, Costs
  27. THE FAMILY: GLOBAL VARIETY, Marriage Patterns, Patterns of Descent
  28. FUNCTIONS OF FAMILY:Reproduction, Social placement
  29. FAMILY AND MARRIAGE IN TRANSITION:Family is losing functions
  30. GENDER: A SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION, Gender socialization
  31. GENDER SOCIALIZATION:Role of family, Gender Stratification
  32. EXPLANATIONS OF GENDER INEQUALITY:Conflict Explanations, Feminism
  33. FUNCTIONS OF SCHOOLING:Cultural Innovation, School Tracking
  34. ISSUES IN EDUCATION:Low Enrollment, High Dropout, Gender Disparity
  35. POPULATION STUDY AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE:Crude Birth Rate
  36. THEORY OF POPULATION GROWTH:Theory of Demographic Transition
  37. POPULATION PROFILE OF PAKISTAN:World Population Growth
  38. POPULATION PROFILE OF PAKISTAN (Continued):Age Distribution, Sex Composition
  39. IMPLICAIONS OF POPULATION GOWTH:Additional GDP needed per year
  40. POPULATION POLICY:Goals of Population Policy, Objectives, Strategies
  41. ENVIRONMENT AND SOCIETY:Global Dimension, Historical Dimension
  42. ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES:Preserving Clean Water, Clearing the Air
  43. SOCIAL CHANGE:Social change is controversial.
  44. CAUSES OF SOCIAL CHANGE:Culture and Change, Conflict and Change, Modernization
  45. MODERNITY AND POST MODERNITY:Cultural Patterns, Post-modernity