UNDERSTANDING CULTURE, SOCIETY, & POLITICS

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CHAPTER 1 Society, Culture, and Politics

Lesson: Understanding Society
Society
Is defined as a group of people living together in organized communities,
following common laws, values, customs, and traditions.
Societal Features
1. Territory
All societies occupy a definite area or space on the planet.
2. Size
A society is relatively large in terms of the number of members, a trait
common in most societies today.
3. Common culture
Way of living otherwise they would not be able to coherently relate and
interact with one another.
4. Sense of belongingness
Members of society must identify with it and feel that they belong there.
5. Common historical experience
The feeling that everyone in the particular society has a common destiny.
6. Common language
The existence of a major one that everyone understands and uses as part of
its national patrimony and heritage.
7. Autonomy
Expressed in a society’s capacity to sustain its existence vis-à-vis other
societies through social institutions that organize, manage and regulate it
from within.
Social Institutions
Defined as an organized system of social relationships that represent a society’s
common values and procedures.

There are six generally recognized institutions in every society.

1. Family
Considered as the bedrock or foundation of the society.
2. Education
The formal institution designated to preserve and transfer cultural knowledge
and identity to the members of a society.
3. Economy
The social institution generally responsible for the production and the
allocation of scarce resources and services.

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4. Government
A social institution which states policy and law is enforced.
5. Media
A social institution responsible for the circulation of vital information among
the members of a society.
6. Religion
An organized collection of beliefs intended to explain the meaning, origin, and
purpose of life and existence.

The Study of Society

1. Structural Functionalism Theory
Sees society as a structure with interrelated parts designed to meet the
biological and social needs of the individuals in that society.
2. Conflict Theory
Is a theory that society is in a state of perpetual conflict because
of competition for limited resources.
3. Symbolic Interactionism
Focus on social interaction; everyday events in which people communicate,
interpret, and respond to each other’s words and actions.

Lesson : Understanding Culture

Culture
is a complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom
and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.
- Edward Burnett Tylor, 1871
Aspects of Culture
1. Culture is dynamic, flexible, and adaptive.
2. Culture is shared and contested.
3. Culture is learned and transmitted through socialization or
enculturation.
4. Culture is a set of patterned social interactions.
5. Culture is integrated and at times unstable.
6. Culture requires language and other forms of communication.
Types of Culture
1. Material Culture

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Human’s material or physical inventions and innovations such as tools,

weapons, instruments, artifacts, dwellings, food, and artistic expressions and
the likes are all part of material culture.
2. Nonmaterial Culture
Refers to the intangible ideas that form within a society, including beliefs,
perceptions, religion, myths, legends, language, and traditions.

Variations of Culture
1. High Culture and Low/Pop Culture
A. High Culture
It is a collection of ideologies, beliefs, thoughts, trends, practices and
works-- intellectual or creative-- that is intended for refined, cultured and
educated elite people.
B. Low/Pop Culture
Popular culture or sometimes called low culture is the patterns of behavior
followed by the common people. In other words, it’s the culture of the
masses. Popular culture is something that is always, most importantly,
related to everyday average people and their experiences of the world; it is
urban, changing and consumeristic in nature.
2. Subculture and Counterculture
A. Subculture
Includes people who may accept much of the dominant culture but are set
apart from it by one or more culturally significant characteristics.
B. Counterculture
Are groups of people who differ in certain ways from the dominant culture
and whose norms and values may be incompatible with it.
3. Ideal Culture and Real Culture
A. Ideal Culture
The ways in which people describe their way of life. It is the standards
society would like to embrace and live up to.
B. Real Culture
Refers to the actual behavior of people in the society. It is the way society
actually is, based on what occurs and exists.
Components/Elements of Culture
1. Symbol
Something to which people attach meaning and then use to communicate
with one another.
A. Gestures
The ways in which people use their bodies to communicate with one
another.
B. Language
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A system of symbols that can be combined in an infinite number of ways

and can represent not only objects but also abstract thoughts.
2. Ideas
A thought or a collection of thoughts that generate in mind.
A. Values
the standards by which people define what is desirable or undesirable,
good or bad, beautiful or ugly.
B. Beliefs
represent man’s convictions about the reality of things.
3. Norms
A set of norms is a society’s standards of acceptable behavior.
A. Folkways
Are the accumulated and repetitive patterns of expected behavior which
tend to be self-perpetuating.
B. Mores
Are social norms which are strongly morally sanctioned.
C. Taboo
Refers to a norm so strongly ingrained that even the thought of its
violation is greeted with revulsion.
D. Laws
Are formalized social norms enacted by the people who are vested with
political powers.

Orientations in Viewing Other Cultures/The Cross-cultural Perspective

1. Ethnocentrism
Pertains to the belief that one’s native culture is superior to or the most
natural among other cultures. An ethnocentric person sees and weighs
another culture based upon the values and standards of his/her own.
2. Xenocentrism
The belief that one’s culture is inferior to another. A xenocentric person
usually has a high regard for other cultures but disdains his/her own or
embarrassed by it.
3. Cultural Relativism
The practice of viewing another culture by its own context rather than
assessing it based on the standards of one’s own culture to avoid personal
biases and assumptions in studying culture.

CHAPTER 2 Human Biocultural and Sociopolitical

Evolution

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Lesson : Hominization
Biological Evolution/Hominization

It is the physical transformation of modern humans from hominids into thinking

modern humans or Homo sapiens.

Hominization
1. Homo habilis
Nickname: Handy Man
Discovery Date: 1960
Where Lived: Eastern and Southern Africa
When Lived: 2.4 million to 1.4 million years ago
Height: average 3 ft 4 in - 4 ft 5 in (100 - 135 cm)
Weight: average 70 lbs (32 kg)
This species, one of the earliest members of the genus Homo, has a slightly
larger braincase and smaller face and teeth than in Australopithecus or older
hominin species. But it still retains some ape-like features, including long
arms and a moderately-prognathic face.
Its name, which means ‘handy man’, was given in 1964 because this species
was thought to represent the first maker of stone tools. Currently, the oldest
stone tools are dated slightly older than the oldest evidence of the
genus Homo.
2. Homo erectus
Where Lived: (Northern Georgia); East Asia (China and Indonesia)
When Lived: Between about 1.89 million and 110,000 years ago
Height: Ranges from 4 ft 9 in - 6 ft 1 in (145 - 185 cm)
Weight: Ranges from 88 - 150 lbs (40 - 68 kg)
Early African Homo erectus fossils (sometimes called Homo ergaster) are the
oldest known early humans to have possessed modern human-like body
proportions with relatively elongated legs and shorter arms compared to the
size of the torso. These features are considered adaptations to a life lived on
the ground, indicating the loss of earlier tree-climbing adaptations, with the
ability to walk and possibly run long distances. Compared with earlier fossil
humans, note the expanded braincase relative to the size of the face. The most
complete fossil individual of this species is known as the ‘Turkana Boy’ – a
well-preserved skeleton (though minus almost all the hand and foot bones),
dated around 1.6 million years old. Microscopic study of the teeth indicates
that he grew up at a growth rate similar to that of a great ape. There is fossil
evidence that this species cared for old and weak individuals. The appearance
of Homo erectus in the fossil record is often associated with the earliest
handaxes, the first major innovation in stone tool technology.

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3. Homo neanderthalensis
Nickname: Neanderthal
Discovery Date: 1829
Where Lived: Europe and southwestern to central Asia
When Lived: About 400,000 - 40,000 years ago
Height: Males: average 5 ft 5 in (164 cm); Females: average 5 ft 1 in (155 cm)
Weight: Males: average 143 lbs (65 kg); Females: average 119 lbs (54 kg)
Neanderthals (the ‘th’ pronounced as ‘t’) are our closest extinct human
relative. Some defining features of their skulls include the large middle part
of the face, angled cheek bones, and a huge nose for humidifying and warming
cold, dry air. Their bodies were shorter and stockier than ours, another
adaptation to living in cold environments. But their brains were just as large
as ours and often larger - proportional to their brawnier bodies.
Neanderthals made and used a diverse set of sophisticated tools, controlled
fire, lived in shelters, made and wore clothing, were skilled hunters of large
animals and also ate plant foods, and occasionally made symbolic or
ornamental objects. There is evidence that Neanderthals deliberately buried
their dead and occasionally even marked their graves with offerings, such as
flowers. No other primates, and no earlier human species, had ever practiced
this sophisticated and symbolic behavior.DNA has been recovered from more
than a dozen Neanderthal fossils, all from Europe; the Neanderthal Genome
Project is one of the exciting new areas of human origins research.
4. Homo sapiens
Where Lived: Evolved in Africa, now worldwide
When Lived: About 300,000 years ago to present
The species that you and all other living human beings on this planet belong
to is Homo sapiens. During a time of dramatic climate change 300,000 years
ago, Homo sapiens evolved in Africa. Like other early humans that were living
at this time, they gathered and hunted food, and evolved behaviors that
helped them respond to the challenges of survival in unstable environments.
Anatomically, modern humans can generally be characterized by the lighter
build of their skeletons compared to earlier humans. Modern humans have
very large brains, which vary in size from population to population and
between males and females, but the average size is approximately 1300 cubic
centimeters. Housing this big brain involved the reorganization of the skull
into what is thought of as "modern" -- a thin-walled, high vaulted skull with
a flat and near vertical forehead. Modern human faces also show much less
(if any) of the heavy brow ridges and prognathism of other early humans. Our
jaws are also less heavily developed, with smaller teeth. Scientists sometimes
use the term “anatomically modern Homo sapiens” to refer to members of our
own species who lived during prehistoric times.

Lesson : Humanization

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Cultural Evolution/Humanization
it refers to the changes or development in cultures from a simple form to a more
complex form of human culture. A result of human adaptation to the different
factors like changes in climates or in their environment and population increase.
Man’s Cultural Evolution
1. Paleolithic Age
In the Paleolithic period (roughly 2.5 million years ago to 10,000 B.C.),
early humans lived in caves or simple huts or tepees and were hunters
and gatherers. They used basic stone and bone tools, as well as crude
stone axes, for hunting birds and wild animals. They cooked their prey,
including woolly mammoths, deer and bison, using controlled fire.
They also fished and collected berries, fruit and nuts.
Ancient humans in the Paleolithic period were also the first to leave
behind art. They used combinations of minerals, ochres, burnt bone
meal and charcoal mixed into water, blood, animal fats and tree saps
to etch humans, animals and signs. They also carved small figurines
from stones, clay, bones and antlers.
The end of this period marked the end of the last Ice Age, which
resulted in the extinction of many large mammals and rising sea levels
and climate change that eventually caused man to migrate.
2. Neolithic Age
the Neolithic period (roughly 8,000 B.C. to 3,000 B.C.), ancient
humans switched from hunter/gatherer mode to agriculture and food
production. They domesticated animals and cultivated cereal grains.
They used polished hand axes, adzes for ploughing and tilling the land
and started to settle in the plains. Advancements were made not only
in tools but also in farming, home construction and art, including
pottery, sewing and weaving.
3. Copper Age
The 1,000-year-long Copper Age is also known as the Chalcolithic Period. It
lasted from about 4500 B.C. to 3500 B.C., overlapping with the early Bronze
Age. Some cultures and individuals used Copper Age technology after the
Copper Age was over. The word Chalcolithic is derived from the Greek words
“chalco” (copper) and “lithos”(stone). The oldest copper ornament dates back
to around 8700 B.C. and it was found in present-day northern Iraq. There is
evidence for copper smelting and recovery through processing of malachite
and azurite in different parts of the world dating back to 5000 B.C.. Copper
pipes used to carry water, dating back to around 2700 B.C., were found in
one of the Egyptian pyramids. The Latin name for copper is Cuprum (Cu). It

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is believed that it has originated from the island of Cyprus where the Romans
used to mine copper from its rich copper mines.
Copper was being fashioned into implements and gold was being fashioned
into ornaments about 6,000 years ago, 3,000 years before the Greeks and
Roman empires. Copper was the first metal to be worked by man on a
relatively large scale in part because it is found in "large pure ingots in a
natural state" in many different locations around the world. Axes, points and
armor could be fashioned by simply hammering the metal; melting it wasn't
necessary.
4. Bronze Age
During the Bronze Age (about 3,000 B.C. to 1,300 B.C.), metalworking
advances were made, as bronze, a copper and tin alloy, was discovered.
Now used for weapons and tools, the harder metal replaced its stone
predecessors, and helped spark innovations including the ox-drawn
plow and the wheel.
This time period also brought advances in architecture and a rt,
including the invention of the potter’s wheel, and textiles —clothing
consisted of mostly wool items such as skirts, kilts, tunics and cloaks.
Home dwellings morphed to so-called roundhouses, consisting of a
circular stone wall with a thatched or turf roof, complete with a
fireplace or hearth, and more villages and cities began to form.
Organized government, law and warfare, as well as beginnings of
religion, also came into play during the Bronze Age, perhaps most
notably relating to the ancient Egyptians who built
the pyramids during this time. The earliest written accounts,
including Egyptian hieroglyphs and petroglyphs (rock engravings), are
also dated to this era.
5. Iron Age
The discovery of ways to heat and forge iron kicked off the Iron
Age (roughly 1,300 B.C. to 900 B.C.). At the time, the metal was seen
as more precious than gold, and wrought iron (which would be
replaced by steel with the advent of smelting iron) was easier to
manufacture than bronze.
Along with mass production of steel tools and weapons, t he age saw
even further advances in architecture, with four-room homes, some
complete with stables for animals, joining more rudimentary hill forts,
as well as royal palaces, temples and other religious structures. Early
city planning also took place, with blocks of homes being erected along
paved or cobblestone streets and water systems put into place.

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Agriculture, art and religion all became more sophisticated, and

writing systems and written documentation, including alphabets,
began to emerge, ushering in the Early Historical Period.

CHAPTER 3 Becoming a Member of the Society

Lesson : Identity and Personality Formation

Socialization

It primarily consists of processes and techniques observed by members of the

society towards an acceptable, proper, and desirable way of living and occurs
through social interaction and transmission of culture in a particular group. It
helps shape and develop an individual’s personality, allowing the person to learn
and adopt the culture of the society where he/she belongs. - Hunt

Theories of Socialization
1. Looking-glass self (Charles Horton Cooley)
Individuals gain an impression of how people perceive them as the individuals
interact with them. In effect, individuals “see” themselves when they interact
with other people, as if they are looking in a mirror. Individuals use the
perceptions that others have of them to develop judgments and feelings about
themselves.
2. Taking the role of the other (George Herbert Mead)
Children pretend to be other people in their play and in so doing learn what
these other people expect of them. Younger children take the role of significant
others, or the people, most typically parents and siblings, who have the most
contact with them; older children when they play sports and other games take
on the roles of other people and internalize the expectations of the generalized
other, or society itself.
3. Psychoanalytic (Sigmund Freud)
The personality consists of the id, ego, and superego. If a child does not
develop normally and the superego does not become strong enough to
overcome the id, antisocial behavior may result.
4. Cognitive development (Jean Piaget)
Cognitive development occurs through four stages. The final stage is the
formal operational stage, which begins at age 12 as children begin to use
general principles to resolve various problems.
5. Moral development (Lawrence Kohlberg, Carol Gilligan)

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Children develop their ability to think and act morally through several stages.
If they fail to reach the conventional stage, in which adolescents realize that
their parents and society have rules that should be followed because they are
morally right to follow, they might well engage in harmful behavior. Whereas
boys tend to use formal rules to decide what is right or wrong, girls tend to
take personal relationships into account.
6. Identity development (Erik Erikson)
Identity development encompasses eight stages across the life course. The
fifth stage occurs in adolescence and is especially critical because teenagers
often experience an identity crisis as they move from childhood to adulthood.
7. Presentation of self (Erving Goffman)
the presentation of self in everyday life, is the performance by social actors of
different roles, parts, and routines on various stages with different settings
and props. And, as in the theater, the success of any role performance is
contingent, in part, on the particular audience that is present and that
responds to the cues and miscues (mistaken signals) actors convey.

Agents of Socialization
1. Family
Is where children establish their first close emotional ties, learn language and
begins to internalize and imbibe values and attitudes from their parents and
tries to become like them.
2. Peer Groups
Enable a person to produce a set of behaviors, attitudes, values and beliefs
that conform to their own. It is through friends and peers that individuals can
shape an aspect of their identity outside of the supervision of adults. Within
these groups, young people can explore interest that may not be of interest to
teachers or parents, such as fashion, popular culture, and even taboo topics
such as drugs, alcohol, and sex. Friends and peers continue to exert influence
throughout a person’s lifetime.
3. School
Is a significant source of enculturation and socialization. Here, they learn the
norms and values that are more generally accepted by society. They also
develop the skills that they will need to be productive later in life. As learning
institutions, schools are one of the places where young people can realize
their potential and work towards improving themselves in a process called
self-actualization.
4. Religion
Is defined as a social institution involving beliefs and practices based on
recognizing the sacred. Religious institutions serve as socializing agents that
provide believers with clear guidelines on how they should live.

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5. Mass Media
Are the various forms of communication that reach a large audience without
any personal contact between the senders and the receivers of the messages
The power of mass media lies in their ability to shape people’s awareness,
ideas, events, and even personal thoughts are transmitted at ever increasing
speeds. The mass media are unquestionably a powerful socializing influence.

Types of Socialization
1. Primary Socialization
Refers to socialization of the infant in the primary or earliest years of his life.
It is a process by which the infant learns language and cognitive skills,
internalizes norms and values. The infant learns the ways of a given grouping
and is molded into an effective social participant of that group. The norms of
society become part of the personality of the individual. The child does not
have a sense of wrong and right. By direct and indirect observation and
experience, he gradually learns the norms relating to wrong and right things.
The primary socialization takes place in the family.
2. Secondary Socialization
The process can be seen at work outside the immediate family, in the ‘peer
group’. The growing child learns very important lessons in social conduct from
his peers. He also learns lessons in the school. Hence, socialization continues
beyond and outside the family environment. Secondary socialization generally
refers to the social training received by the child in institutional or formal
settings and continues throughout the rest of his life.
3. Anticipatory Socialization
Anticipatory socialization refers to a process by which men learn the culture
of a group with the anticipation of joining that group. As a person learns the
proper beliefs, values and norms of a status or group to which he aspires, he
is learning how to act in his new role.
4. Resocialization
The process of learning new norms, values, attitudes, and behaviors. It refers
to the process of discarding former behavior patterns and accepting new ones
as part of a transition in one’s life. Such re-socialization takes place mostly
when a social role is radically changed. It involves abandonment of one way
of life for another which is not only different from the former but incompatible
with it. For example, when a criminal is rehabilitated, he has to change his
role radically.
5. Developmental Socialization
Builds on already acquired skills and knowledge as the adult progresses
through new situations- such as marriage or new jobs-that requires new
expectations, obligations, and roles.
6. Degradation Ceremony

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A term coined by Harold Garfinkel to refer to a ritual whose goal is to remake

someone’s self by stripping away that individual’s self-identity and stamping
a new identity in its place.

Lesson : Social Process

Social Processes

Refers to forms of social interaction that occur repeatedly. By social process it

means the ways in which individuals and groups interact and establish social
relationships.

Types of Social Processes

1. Enculturation
This social process is defined as the manner by which a person learns or
adopts the culture followed by his/her co-members in a society. Example is
when parents teach their children about values, norms, traditions, and other
aspects of their culture.
2. Acculturation and Assimilation
The process is when a person adapts to the influence of another culture by
borrowing man of its aspects. For example, an overseas Filipino worker (OFW)
in a foreign country. To survive working in a foreign environment, the OFW
must learn how to adapt to the new culture, through keeping the Filipino
culture in his/her way of living, such as eating Filipino food, bonding with
other Filipino OFW’s, and the like. This is an example of a person accultured
to another to another while maintaining his/her mother culture. Now, if
acculturation implies immersion in another culture while maintaining one’s
mother culture, assimilation denotes complete or almost total adaptation of
the minor culture to the major one. In assimilation, an individual learns a
new culture, tending to lose entirely his/her previously held cultural identity.
3. Cooperation
Is a form of social interaction wherein two or more persons work together for
a common end or purpose. Cooperation ranges from small to wide ranges
from the teamwork in a class, bonding among peers, helping family members

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or relatives, and sharing expertise with fellow workers to maintaining peace

between nations through diplomatic negotiations.
4. Differentiation
Is the process of designating each member of a society with particular
functions and roles intended for the society to achieve stability and order,
thus, the increased number of social units. Differentiation may be seen in the
community of medical practitioners and government agencies. These
communities are composed of experts, technocrats, and think-tanks from the
various fields that provide specific services for the varying needs of people.
5. Amalgamation
It happens when two families or groups become one through a formal union,
such as marriage. It promotes acculturation and assimilation, and is the
opposite of differentiation since it reduces the number of social units.
6. Stratification
In the light of social process, it can be regarded as the division of society into
social categories that in turn develop social groups. It is mainly based in
wealth and income differences.
7. Conflict and Competition
Conflict and competition are two social processes that are interchangeably
used, since both suggests vying for a particular resource. Conflict happens
when a party fails to communicate effectively its message to the other, thus
creating misunderstanding. The inclination of a person to disregard the
interest and/or welfare of others also often leads to conflict. Competition, on
the other hand, suggests the struggle between two or more persons or groups
that can be translated to innovation.
Social Interaction
What people do when they are in one another’s presence; includes
communications at a distance.
Theories of Social Interaction
1. Symbolic Interaction
Communication process supplies meaning, and people’s actions reflect their
interpretation of that meaning.
2. Ethnomethodology
An often unrecognized social order that underlies everyday social activity.
3. Dramaturgical Analysis
The participants in social interaction behave like actors in a play.

Mechanisms of Social Interaction

1. Imitation

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Means replicating or copying an object or an action of an individual.

2. Suggestion
The tendency to react is already present and can be directed in any situation
almost automatically.
3. Empathy
Is the ability to put one’ self in the place of another so as to feel as he or she
would if confronted by the same circumstances.
4. Identification
It is the ability not only to place one’s self in the position of another but
actually to feel that he or she is the other person.

Social Status

It refers to the position that someone occupies in a social group. As we interact

with the people around us, we do so while occupying a particular status, which
is synonymous to a social position. It serves as a reference point that structure
our interactions with the people around us.

Dynamics of Social Status

Status Set
It refers to all the statuses or positions a person possesses in a single moment.
You may simultaneously be a son or daughter, a worker, a boyfriend or girlfriend,
and a student. Obviously your status set changes as your particular statuses
change.
For example, if you graduate from college, take a full-time job, get married, buy
a home, and have children, your status set changes to include the positions of
worker, spouse, homeowner, and parent.
Two Ways to Obtain our Statuses
1. Ascribed Status
Is one that is received at birth, inherited, or involuntarily given during a
person’s life. Such as your race– ethnicity, sex, and the social class of your
parents, as well as your statuses as female or male, daughter or son, niece or
nephew. They are given to you later in life.
2. Achieved Status
Is a social position that a person chooses to take on, and obtaining it usually
entails effort. For example, you become a student, a friend, a spouse, or a
lawyer. Or, for lack of effort (or for efforts that others fail to appreciate), you
become a school dropout, a former friend, an ex-spouse, or a debarred lawyer.
As you can see, achieved statuses can be either positive or negative; both
college president and bank robber are achieved statuses.
Status Symbol

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People who are pleased with their social status often want others to recognize
their position. To elicit this recognition, they use status symbols, signs that
identify a status.For example, people wear wedding rings to announce their
marital status; uniforms, guns, and badges to proclaim that they are police
officers (and, not so subtly, to let you know that their status gives them authority
over you). All of us use status symbols. We use them to announce our statuses
to others and to help smooth our interactions in everyday life.
Master Status
It cuts across your other statuses that an individual occupies. Usually a person’s
master status is her or her primary occupation, since it is closely connected to
education and social class.
Status Inconsistency
Our statuses usually fit together fairly well, but some people have a mismatch
among their statuses. For example, A 14-year-old college student is an example.
So is a 40-year-old married woman who is dating a 19-year-old college
sophomore.

Social Roles
The behaviors, obligations, and privileges attached to a status. For example,
having the status of a varsity athlete necessitates the roles of attending training
sessions and representing the school in competitions.

Dynamics of Social Roles

Role Set
Each status is accompanied by multiple roles, and as such, the term role set
designates the full list of expected behavior attached to a single status.
Role Performance
The particular interpretation that you give a role, your “style,” is known as role
performance. Consider how you play your role as a son or daughter. Perhaps you
play the role of ideal daughter or son—being respectful, coming home at the
hours your parents set, and happily running errands. Or this description may
not even come close to your particular role performance.
Role Conflict
Occurs when tension arises between roles connected to two different statuses.
For example, if one is both student and varsity athlete, and it is exam week, the
person will have to make decision between the role of attending a sports
completion and studying for the exams.
Role Strain
Occurs when tension arises between different roles connected to one status. For
example, a woman with a status of a single parent. She has to fulfill the role of
working to provide for her child, while at the same time being available to provide

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affection, guidance, and support. The difference between role conflict and role
strain is that role conflict is conflict between roles, while role strain is conflict
within a role.
Lesson : Understanding Deviant Behavior
Conformity

Is the process of altering one’s thoughts and actions to adapt to the accepted
behavior within his or her group or society.

Types of Conformity
1. Compliance
Refers to the outward conformity to social pressure but privately disagreeing
with it. This action is often motivated by the desire to gain rewards or avoid
punishment.
2. Internalization/Acceptance
This occurs when an individual accepts influence because the content of the
induced behavior—the ideas and actions of which it is composed—is
intrinsically rewarding. He adopts the induced behavior because it is
congruent or consistent with his value system.
3. Identification
This occurs when an individual accepts influence because he wants to
establish or maintain a satisfying self-defining relationship to another person
or group. Individuals conform to the expectations of a social role, eg. Nurses,
police officers.
Deviance
Violation of established social norms, whether folkways, mores, or laws.
Deviance varies among societies around the world. It depends upon the context
of the norm, the condition in the society, and the people’s response to a
particular behavior.
Theories of Deviance
1. Differential Association Theory
Edwin Sutherland’s term to indicate that people who associate with some
groups learn an “excess of definitions” of deviance, increasing the likelihood
that they will become deviant.
2. Control Theory
The idea that two control systems—inner controls and outer controls—work
against our tendencies to deviate.
3. Labeling theory

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The view that the labels people are given affect their own and others’
perceptions of them, thus channeling their behavior into either deviance or
conformity.
4. Strain Theory
Robert Merton’s term tells the extent and type of deviance people engage in
depend on whether a society provides the institutionalized means (such as
schooling and job opportunities) to achieve cultural goals (such as financial
success).
A. Innovation
Individuals who want success, but reject the idea of hard work, could
pursue their goals through unconventional means, such as stealing, drug
dealing, or other forms of crime. Although their actions are considered
socially unacceptable, “innovating” provided them with a way to become
wealthy.
B. Ritualism
A second response to being unable to do well the conventional way is to
abandon the goal of success altogether. Ritualists continue to work and
follow the rules, but are deviant in their rejection of the final goal.
C. Retreatism
When people reject both the goal of success and the means of achieving it,
they simply disengage from socially acceptable ways of living. Alcoholics,
drug addicts, and some homeless people can be described as retreatists.
D. Rebellion
It is like retreatism in that it rejects success and the process of obtaining
it. However, rather than simply retreating, people aggressively overturn
the existing social order through rebellion. It seeks to give society new
goals, as well as new means for reaching them.

Social Control

In order to regulate deviance with the social norms, society created measures in
order to limit deviance. It refers to the efforts of a group or society to regulate the
behavior of its members in conformity with established norms. Social control is
the study of the mechanisms, in the form of patterns of pressure, through which
society maintains social order and cohesion. Social control is typically employed
by group members in response to anyone it considers deviant, problematic,
threatening, or undesirable, with the goal of ensuring conformity.

Sanctions

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Social sanctions are the enforcement mechanisms for social norms. They are the
tools for shaping and maintaining social norms. Social sanctions are an
important method of communicating the nature of social norms, so they have an
important role in the creation and maintenance of social norms. Social sanctions
are social reactions that represent judgement on others behavior and can be as
subtle as a nod or smile for conformity or a shake of the head or a look of
disapproval for nonconformity. Social sanctions are often considered to be
punishments, like legal sanctions. However, social sanctions can also be positive
for adherence to normative standards.

Examples of Social Sanctions

1. Negative Sanctions
Negative sanctions can include embarrassment, shame, ridicule, sarcasm,
criticism, disapproval, social discrimination, and exclusion as well as more
formal sanctions such as penalties and fines.
2. Positive Sanctions
Positive sanctions can include celebration, congratulation, praise, social
recognition, social promotion, and approval, as well as formal sanctions such
as awards, bonuses, prizes, and titles.

Types of Social Sanctions

1. Formal sanctions
Are imposed through formal means by an institution (or representative) upon
an individual or group. They are normally clearly defined and can include
fines for deviation or rewards for compliance. They are often documented in
policy, rules or regulations.
2. Informal sanctions
Are rules or norms that are 'unwritten' and not enforced by an official
authority. Informal sanctions are not laws in a legal sense, but occur regularly
in society. Informal sanctions are typically the result of individual
dissatisfaction rather than societal or institutional regulations.

CHAPTER 4 Organization of a Society

SOCIAL GROUP

Is a number of people with similar norms, values, and expectations who regularly
and consciously interact with one another. – Richard Schaefer

Related Concepts to Social Group

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1. Social Category
Is a collection of individuals who have at least one attribute in common but
otherwise do not necessarily interact.
2. Social Aggregate
Is a collection of people who are in the same place at the same time but who
otherwise do not necessarily interact, except in the most superficial ways, or
have anything in common.
Group Variations/Dynamics
1. Primary Group and Secondary Group
Primary Groups are characterized by members having personal and intimate
relationships and having interactions which occur frequently. They are
usually small, and individuals in these types of groups spend a lot time
together and engage in a variety of activities together. Relationships in these
groups tend to endure for long periods of time. Families are the earliest forms
of primary groups that are we encounter and they can continue to impact our
lives during adulthood. As we get older, we can participate in other types of
primary groups, such as our circle of closest friends whom we meet either in
school, at work, or even through associations of mutual interest.
Secondary groups are larger, more impersonal, and their activities are
usually oriented towards the achievement of a goal. Examples of this are
coworkers in a company or colleagues within a school. In both cases, the
individuals involved do not cultivate emotional relationships, do not have
intimate knowledge of one another, and only engage in a narrow range of
activities related to their goals.
2. In-group and Out-group
The classification of groups may also refer to the feeling of belongingness and
feeling of antagonism among the members.
In-group is one wherein a person belongs to, and consequently, he or she
views it with respect and loyalty. There is such a high regard for each member
that collective terms like “we”, “us”, or “tayo” are commonly used.
Out-group is one that an individual does not belong to, and which is perceived
as inferior, hostile, or as a source of competition. The members of out-group
feel as though they should not have been in that specific group.
When it comes to solidarity, an in-group exhibits a perfect example. However,
the group’s strong feeling of distinction creates a sense of supremacy toward
other groups. If the members have high regard of themselves, they tend to be
blind to other groups’ merit. In some instances, the members of in-groups
tend to look down on or ignore the out-groups, thus creating discrimination.
3. Reference Groups
Serve as a standard or basis for evaluating oneself or making decisions. It can
also makes a comparative function because one individual always has an
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inclination to compare himself/herself with others. A person may be

influenced by more than one reference groups. For example, when newly-
graduated senior high school students select their college major because it is
what their parents wanted or chose for them, they are being influenced by
primary groups. Another, when a student gets a grade of 89 percent and say
that he or she did not do well, the student is equating himself/herself to
his/her peers who scored 90 percent or higher. Thus, awareness of our
reference groups is important because it not only shapes how we think of
ourselves, but also our future actions and decisions.
4. Network
Is the structure of connection of an individual with oneself, with other
individual/s, and group/s. It can be either be small or vast, intrapersonal or
interpersonal, emergent, and complex. For example, a school’s student
population has a small network of academic and non-academic organizations
(i.e., Parent-Teacher Association, Sports Team, Music Club, Student Council,
Dance Company) inside the school. Likewise, the school as a group is also a
member of wide networks of school within the city, region, country, and the
world.

Formal Organizations
Is a type of secondary group that is formed to achieve goals efficiently. Examples
of these are business corporations and government agencies. Formal
organizations are necessary in order to facilitate processes that we normally
taken for granted. For example, the construction and maintenance of roads,
delivery of mails , the production of gadgets, and even the transport of food
products to groceries all require the work of individuals who are part of formal
organizations.

Types of Formal Organization (According to Amitai Etzioni)

1. Utilitarian
Rewards employees for their work, either through salaries or benefits.
Example is business corporations.
2. Normative
People participate not to be paid, but in order to pursue an objective that they
consider moral or worthy. Examples of these are volunteer organizations,
such as charities or socially-oriented groups that implement projects to
support marginalized groups in society.
3. Coercive
Force people into participation and are used in extreme cases. For example,
the prison which is used to punish criminals, and the mental health asylum,
where some people with psychiatric disorders are admitted involuntarily.

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Bureaucracy
Is a model of organization that is designed for efficiency of tasks. It is one of the
characteristics of formal organizations that exist at present.
The Characteristics of Bureaucracies (Max Weber)
1. Division of Labor/Specialization
Clear-cut division of labor among the various officials. Individuals are
assigned to perform specific tasks, which keep them focused and allows them
to work more rapidly.
2. Hierarchy of Authority/Positions
There is a vertical ranking of roles in a bureaucracy. Employees are managed
by supervisors, who are overseen by people above them, and so on. The
number of people in the lower positions usually outnumbers those above.
This setup ensures that there is supervision over all levels of the organization.
3. Written Rules and Regulations
Day-to-day functioning of the bureaucracy governed by an elaborate system
of rules and regulations. To increase predictability of behavior, bureaucracies
function through explicitly stated codes of conduct that guide what people
can and cannot do.
4. Impersonality
Officials treating people as “cases” not as individuals. Bureaucracies prioritize
rules and regulations above personal relationships. As such, it should not
matter who you are. When dealing with a bureaucratic organization, you are
made to follow their procedures.
5. Meritocracy/Technical Competence
People are hired by organizations because of their knowledge, skills, and
training. In order for the group to work efficiently, its members need to know
what they are doing.

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