WEEK 3: THE SELF ACCORDING TO SOCIOLOGY AND

ANTHROPOLOGY
Sociology and Anthropology Sociology and Anthropology are two interrelated disciplines that
contributes to the understanding of self. Sociology presents the self as a product of modern
society. It is the science that studies the development, structure, interaction, and collective
behavior of human being. On the other hand, Anthropology is the study of humanity. This broad
field takes an interdisciplinary approach to looking at human culture, both past and present. The
following set of sociologists and anthropologist offered their views about self.

George Herbert Mead and the Social Self

• Mead is an American philosopher, sociologist, and psychologist. He is regarded as one of the
founders of social psychology and the American sociological tradition in general. Mead is well-
known for his theory of self.

• He postulated that, the self represents the sum total of people’s conscious perception of their
identity as distinct from others. Mead argued that the self like the mind is social emergent. This
means that individual selves are the products of social interaction and not logical or biological in
nature.

• He claimed that the self is something which undergoes development because it is not present
instantly at birth. The self arises in the process of social experience and activity as a result of their
relations to the said process as a whole and to other individuals within that process. In other
words, one cannot experience their self alone, they need other people to experience their self.

• The social emergence of self is developed due to the three forms of inter-subjective activity,
the language, play, and the game.

• He proposed the stages of self formation:

1. Preparatory Stage. Mead believed that the self did not exist at birth. Instead, the self
develops over time. Its development is dependent on social interaction and social
experience. At this stage, children’s behaviors are primarily based on imitation. It was
observed that children imitate the behaviors of those around them. At this stage, knowing
and understanding the symbols are important for this will constitute their way of
communicating with others throughout their lives.
2. The Play Stage. Skills at knowing and understanding the symbols of communication is
important for this constitutes the basis of socialization. Through communication, social
relationship are formed. Now children begin to role play and pretend to be other people.
Role-taking in the play stage is the process of mentally assuming the process of another
person to see how this person might behave or respond in a given situation (Schefer,
2012). The play stage is significant in the development of the self. It is at this stage where
child widens his perspective and realizes that he is not alone and that there are others
around him whose presence he has to consider.
 3. The Game Stage. Here, the child is about eight or nine years of age and now does
more than just role-take. The child begins to consider several tasks and various types of
relationships simultaneously. Through the learnings that were gained in stage two, the
child now begins to see not only his own perspective but at the same time the perspective
of others. In this final stage of self development, the child now has the ability to respond
not just to one but several members of his social environment.

• Generalized other the person realizes that people in society have cultural norms, beliefs and
values which are incorporated into each self. This realization forms basis of how the person
evaluate themselves.

• The self, according to Mead is not merely a passive reflection of the generalized other. The
responses of the individual to the social world are also active, it means that a person decides
what they will do in reference to the attitude of others but not mechanically determined by such
attitudinal structures. Here, Mead identified the two phases of self:
1. the phase which reflects the attitude of the generalized other or the “me”; and
2. the phase that responds to the attitude of generalized other or the “I”.

• In Mead’s words, the "me" is the social self, and the "I" is a response to the "me". Mead defines
the "me" as "a conventional, habitual individual and the “I” as the “novel reply” of the individual to
the generalized other.

• Generally, Meads theory sees the self as a perspective that comes out of interactions, and he
sees the meanings of symbols, social objects, and the self as emerging from negotiated
interactions.

The Self as a product of modern society among other constructions Georg Simmel
• Simmel was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. He was intensely interested in the
ways in which modern, objective culture impacts the individual’s subjective experiences.

• In contrast to Mead, Simmel proposed that there is something called human nature that is
innate to the individual. This human nature is intrinsic to the individual like the natural inclination
to religious impulse or the gender differences. He also added that most of our social interactions
are individual motivations.

• Simmel as a social thinker made a distinction between subjective and objective culture. The
individual or subjective culture refers to the ability to embrace, use, and feel culture.

• Objective culture is made up of elements that become separated from the individual or group’s
control and identified as separate objects.

• There are interrelated forces in modern society that tend to increase objective culture according
to Simmel. These are urbanizations, money, and the configuration of one’s social network.

• Urbanization is the process that moves people from country to city living. This result to the
concentration of population in one place brought about by industrialization. This paved way to the
organization of labor or increased division of labor, which demands specializations wherein this
creates more objective culture.

• Simmel also stressed that the consumption of products has an individuating and trivializing effect
because this enables the person to create self out of things. By consumption, an individual able
to purchase things that can easily personalized or express the self. People used commodities to
create self-concept and self-image. Simmel also said that products used in the modernity to
express and produced the self is also changing. It becomes more and more separated from
subjectivity (subjective culture) due to division of labor and market economy. Many products are
easily replaced, subjected to the dynamics of fashion and diversification of markets which leads
to inappropriate sign use.

• Money creates a universal value system wherein every commodity can be understood. Money
also increases individual freedom by pursuing diverse activities and by increasing the options for
self expression. Money also makes the individual to be less attached to the commodities because
the individual tends to understand and experience their possession less in terms of their intrinsic
qualities and more of their objective and abstract worth. Additionally, money also discouraged
intimate ties with people. Money comes to stand in the place of almost everything – and this
includes relationship! Money further discourages intimate ties by encouraging a culture of
calculation.

• Because of urbanization, Simmel observed that social networks also changed. Group affiliations
in urban is definitely different from rural settings wherein the relationship are strongly influenced
by family. An individual tends to seek membership to the same group which makes the family as
basic socialization structure. This natural inclination to join groups is called by Simmel as organic
motivation and the grouping is called primary group. This group is based on ties of affection and
personal loyalty endure over long periods of time, and involve multiple aspects of a person’s life.

• On the other hand, in the modern urban settings, group membership is due to rational motivation
or membership due to freedom of choice. This characterized the secondary group which is goal
and utilitarian oriented, with a narrow range of activities, over limited time spans. As a result, it is
more likely that an individual will develop unique personalities. Moreover, Simmel said that a
complex web of group affiliations produces role conflicts and blasé attitude. Role conflict is a
situation that demands a person of two or more roles that clash with one another. Blasé attitude
is an attitude of absolute boredom and lack of concern. This is the inability or limited ability to
provide emotional investment to other people.

The Self and Person in the Contemporary Anthropology

• The four subfields of anthropology – Archeology, Biological Anthropology, Linguistics, and
Cultural Anthropology, suggest that human beings are similar and different in varying ways and
tendencies. For example, people have the same need for food and water, but they have different
means on how to satisfy them. These similarities and differences make life so interesting. As one
learn facts/information that make them similar to the other, they will also discover that they have
different characteristics the define them. This knowledge aims to highlight the uniqueness of each
person and making them value life and existence even more.
The subfields of Anthropology are as follows:
 o Archeology. Focus on the study of the past and how it may have contributed to the
present ways of how people conduct their daily lives. Archeologists have so far discovered
the unique ways in which human beings adapted to the changes in their environment in
order for them to survive. Among their discoveries around the world is the species, homo
sapiens did not become extinct because of their ability to think, use tools and learn from
experience. In relating to the contemporary society, people still aim for survival, for their
basic needs to be fulfilled and to live legacy to their society.
o Biological Anthropology. Focus on how the human body adapts to the different earth
environments. Among the activities of Anthropologists are identification of probable
causes of diseases, physical mutation, and death, evolution, and comparison of dead and
living primates. They are interested in explaining how the biological characteristics of
human being affects their way of living. Accordingly, human beings at present still share
the same biological strengths and vulnerabilities. Like eating balanced nutrients and
minerals that are beneficial to all human beings while being exposed to a virus in a
pandemic might cause negative implications to many.
o Linguistic Anthropology. Focused on using language as means to discover a group’s
manner of social interaction and their worldview. Anthropologists in this field want to
discover how language is used to create and share meanings, to form ideas and concepts
and to promote social change. Furthermore, they also study how language and modes of
communication changes over time.
o Cultural Anthropology. Focused in knowing what makes one group’s manner of living
forms an essential part of the member’s personal and societal identity. This encompasses
the principles of Theory of Cultural Determinism which suggests that the human nature is
determined by the kind of culture he is born and grew up in. Cultural diversities are
manifested in different ways and different levels of dept. The following are the ways in
which culture may manifest itself in people:

 Symbols. These are the words, gestures, pictures or objects that have recognized or
accepted meaning in a particular culture. Example: colors have similar meaning across all
cultures.

 Heroes. These are persons from the past or present who have characteristics that are
important in culture. They may be real of work of fictions. Example: Fiction – Thor, Captain
America; Real – Jose Rizal, Apolinario Mabini.

 Rituals. These are activities participated by a group of people for the fulfilment of
desired objectives and are concerned to be socially essential. Example: Wedding, fiesta,
Christmas celebration, graduation, etc.

 Values. These are considered to be the core of every culture. These are unconscious,
neither discuss or observed, and can only be inferred from the way people act and react
to situations. Example: hospitality, respect for elders etc.

• The field of Anthropology offers another way by which a person can view themselves. As self is
formed or determined by the past and present condition, by biological characteristics, the
communication and language use, and the lifestyle we choose to live
The Self Embedded in the Culture Clifford Geertz
• Clifford Geertz was an Anthropology Professor at the University of Chicago. He studied different
cultures and explored on the conception of the self in his writings entitled, “The Impact of the
Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man” (1966) in his fieldwork at Java, Bali and Morrocco.

• The analysis of Geertz (1966) in his cultural study about the description of self in Bali is that the
Balinese person is extremely concerned not to present anything individual (distinguishing him or
her from others) in social life but to enact exclusively a culturally prescribed role or mask. In one
instance, Geertz (1973) gave an example of the stage fright that pervades persons in Bali because
they must not be publicly recognizable as individual selves and actors points precisely to the fact
that agency or an ability to act in one’s own account is an integral ability of human beings—an
ability which continually threatens the culturally established norm of non individuality