1 BASIC CONCEPTS

Values and Norms

Values are abstract ideals. For example, being faithful to one marriage partner is a prominent value in most Western societies, but in some other cultures, a person may have several wives or husbands. Some cultures value individualism, whereas others emphasize shared needs. Is it possible to describe an “American” culture? Although the United States is culturally diverse, we can identify several characteristics of a uniquely American culture. First, it reflects a particular range of values shared by many, if not all, Americans, such as the belief in the merits of individual achievement or in equality of opportunity. Second, these values are connected to specific norms: For example, it is usually expected that people will work hard to achieve occupational success (Bellah et al., 1985; Parsons, 1951/1964). Third, American culture involves the use of material artifacts created mostly through modern industrial technology, such as cars, mass-produced food, clothing, and so forth.

People in China hold a much stronger belief in the importance of collective effort. Modesty is a strongly held virtue, as reflected in the adage (attributed to Confucius) “When walking in the company of three, there must be one I can learn from.” Although Americans who boast about their self-made success might seem vulgar to the Chinese, some Chinese seem to be changing their values in this regard: China’s Got Talent premiered in 2010 on a Shanghai TV station.

Even within American society, values may conflict. Some groups or individuals might value traditional religious beliefs, whereas others might favor progress and science. Some people might prefer lavish material comfort, whereas others might favor simplicity. In a modern age characterized by the global movement of people, ideas, goods, and information, cultural values will inevitably conflict. Sociological research suggests that such conflicts foster a sense of frustration and isolation (Bellah et al., 1985).

Norms are principles or rules of social life that everyone is expected to observe. Norms of behavior in marriage include the way husbands and wives are supposed to behave toward their in-laws: In some societies, they are expected to develop a close relationship; in others, they keep a clear distance. Like the values they reflect, norms vary across cultures. In the United States, for example, while a woman might wear a hat if it is in fashion, most do not regularly cover their hair and neck with a headscarf. Some more traditional Muslim cultures have a norm calling for women to wear headscarves as a religiously required sign of modesty. While a few highly conservative Muslim cultures might enforce this rule on some women who prefer to dress otherwise, cultural norms regarding dress are often widely accepted; as a result, women in traditional Muslim cultures often prefer to wear headscarves and other forms of more traditional clothing.

Cultural conflict occurs when norms perceived as culturally incompatible collide. The use of veils by Muslim women in predominantly Christian countries, for example, has led to cultural conflict in France (which in 2011 began to enforce a ban on veils in public places) and some other European countries with large immigrant populations from the Middle East or North Africa. In the United States, Europe, and even predominantly Muslim Turkey, religious Muslim women who insist on wearing headscarves often clash with prevailing beliefs that emphasize the separation of church and state, or the belief that a headscarf symbolizes women’s subservience to male-generated beliefs and thus threatens women’s rights (Elver, 2012).

Norms, like the values they reflect, also change over time. For example, beginning in 1964, with a U.S. surgeon general’s report that linked smoking with serious health problems, the U.S. government waged a highly effective campaign to discourage people from smoking. A strong social norm favoring smoking—once associated with independence, sex appeal, and glamour—has now given way to an equally strong social norm depicting smoking as unhealthful, unattractive, and selfish. In 2017, only 14 percent of American adults smoked (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2018), one-third of the percentage in 1964, when the surgeon general’s report was issued.

Symbols

The symbols expressed in speech and writing are the chief ways in which cultural meanings are formed and expressed. But they are not the only ways. Both material objects and aspects of behavior can generate meanings. A signifier is any vehicle of meaning—any set of elements used to communicate. The sounds made in speech are signifiers, as are the marks made on paper or other materials in writing. Other signifiers include dress, pictures or visual signs, modes of eating, forms of building or architecture, and many other material features of culture (Hawkes, 1977). Styles of dress, for example, normally signify differences between men and women. Until relatively recently, women in American culture wore skirts and men pants. In some other cultures, this practice is reversed: Women wear pants and men skirts (Leach, 1976).

Semiotics—the analysis of nonverbal cultural meanings—opens up a fascinating field for sociology because it allows us to contrast the ways in which different cultures are structured. For example, the buildings in cities are not simply places where people live and work; they often have a symbolic character. In traditional cities, the main temple or church usually sat on high ground in or near the city center to symbolize the all-powerful influence of religion. In modern societies, by contrast, the skyscrapers of big business often occupy that symbolic position. Of course, material culture is not simply symbolic but also includes actual, practical objects vital for catering to physical needs—for example, the tools or technology used to acquire food, make weaponry, construct dwellings, and so forth. We have to study both the practical and the symbolic aspects of material culture to understand it completely.

Language

Language demonstrates both the unity and the diversity of human culture because there are no cultures without language, yet there are thousands of languages spoken in the world. Although languages with similar origins have words in common with one another—for example, German and English—most major language groups have no words in common at all.

Language is involved in virtually all our activities. In the form of ordinary speech, it is the means by which we organize most of what we do. (We will discuss the importance of talk and conversation in social life in Chapter 5.) However, language is involved not just in mundane activities but also in ceremony, religion, poetry, and many other spheres. One of its most distinctive features is that it allows us to extend the scope of our thought and experience. Using language, we can convey information about events remote in time or space and can discuss things we have never seen. We can develop abstract concepts, tell stories, and make jokes.

Languages—indeed, all symbols—are representations of reality. Symbols may signify things we imagine, such as mathematical formulas or fictitious creatures, or they may represent (that is, “re-present,” or make present again in our minds) things initially experienced through our senses. Human behavior is oriented toward the symbols we use to represent “reality,” rather than toward the reality itself—and these symbols are determined within a particular culture. When you see a four-footed furry animal, for example, you must determine which cultural symbol to attach to it. Do you decide to call it a dog, a wolf, or something else? If you determine it is a dog, what cultural meaning does that convey? In American culture, dogs are typically regarded as household pets and lavished with affection. In Guatemalan Indian culture, however, dogs are more often seen as guards or scavengers and are treated with an indifference that might seem cruel to Americans. Among the Akha of northern Thailand, dogs are seen as food, and they are treated accordingly. The diversity of cultural meanings attached to the word dog thus requires an act of interpretation.

In the 1930s, the anthropological linguist Edward Sapir and his student Benjamin Lee Whorf advanced the linguistic relativity hypothesis, which argues that language influences our perceptions of the world because we are more likely to be aware of things if we have words for them (Lucy, 1997; Wolff & Holmes, 2011). For example, expert skiers and snowboarders use terms such as black ice, corn, powder, and packed powder to describe different snow and ice conditions to more readily perceive potentially life-threatening situations that would escape the notice of a novice. In a sense, then, experienced winter athletes have a different perception of the world—or, at least, a different perception of the alpine slopes—than do novices.

Language also helps give permanence to a culture and identity to a people. Language outlives any particular speaker or writer, affording a sense of history and cultural continuity. It may seem that the English language is becoming increasingly global, as a primary language of both business and the internet. Yet local attachments to language persist, often out of cultural pride. For example, the French-speaking residents of the Canadian province of Québec are so passionate about their linguistic heritage that they often refuse to speak English, the dominant language of Canada, and they periodically seek political independence from the rest of Canada. Minority languages are sometimes even outlawed by the majority government: Turkey restricts the use of the Kurdish language; similarly, the “English-only” movement in the United States seeks to restrict the language of education and government to English, even though numerous other languages are spoken throughout the country.

Speech and Writing

All societies use speech as a vehicle of language. However, there are other ways of expressing language—most notably, writing. The invention of writing marked a major transition in human history. Writing first began as the drawing up of lists: Marks made on wood, clay, or stone served to keep records about significant events, objects, or people. For example, a mark, or sometimes a picture, might represent each tract of land possessed by a particular family or set of families (Gelb, 1952). Writing began as a means of storing information and as such was closely linked to the administrative needs of the early civilizations. A society that possesses writing can locate itself in time and space. Documents can be accumulated that record the past, and information can be gathered about present-day events and activities.

Written documents, or texts, have qualities distinct from the spoken word. The effect of speech is limited to the contexts in which words are uttered. Ideas and experiences can be passed down through generations in cultures without writing, but only by word of mouth. Texts, on the other hand, can endure for thousands of years, and through them, all varieties of writers from past ages can address us directly. This is why documentary research is so important to historians.