3.3 Research Today: Understanding The Modern World + 3.4 Unanswered Quesionst

Question 1

Colonialism

Answer 1

The process whereby Western nations established their rule in parts of the world away from their home territories

Question 2

Settler Colonialism

Answer 2

Colonialism that took the form of large-scale European settlement. Settler colonialism shaped societies in North America, Australia, and New Zélande.

Other regions in Asia, Africa, and South America saw a form of colonialism where local populations (colonial subjects) remained in the majority and were governed by colonial powers. These societies saw slower levels of industrialization

Question 3

Cultural Capital

Answer 3

The accumulated cultural knowledge within a society that confers power and status.

French sociologist Pierre Bourdiew, who introduced this concept, maintained there were 3 types of cultural capital:

1. What a person embies in their very person (ex. Language, mannerisms, skills)
2. What is reflected in the material objects one possesses (ex. Car, clothes)
3. What is socially determined by larger institutions (ex. Education)

Question 4

Cultural Conformity

Answer 4

One of the challenges for all cultures is to instil in people a willingness to conform.

Encouraging conformity is accomplished in 2 ways:

1. Members learn the norms of their culture starting form childhood (socialization)
2. Social control comes into play when a person fails to conform adequately to a culture’s norms

Cultures differ in how much they value conformity

Question 5

Agents of Socialization

Answer 5

• Média
• Ethno-cultural Background
• Peers
• Family
• Faith/Religion
• Social Groups/Clubs
• Éducation
• Geography
• Government/laws

Question 6

Cultural Appropriation

Answer 6

When members of one cultural group «borrow» elements of another group’s culture

Question 7

George Lipsitz

Answer 7

Argued that when a majority or dominant culture appropriated elements of a minority culture, particularly one that has historically suffered oppression at the hands of the majority, it is especially important that those doing the appropriation be extremely sensitive to the historical meaning and contemporary significance of the cultural forms being appropriated

Question 8

Subcultures

Answer 8

Values and norms distinct form those of the majority, held by a group within a wider society

• Subcultures imply different cultural backgrounds and languages within a larger society, and they include segments of the population that have different cultural patterns.
• Some people identify with a particular subculture, whereas others move among several

Question 9

Countercultures

Answer 9

Cultural groups within a wider society that largely reject the values and norms of the majority

Question 10

Assimilation

Answer 10

The acceptance of a minority group by a majority population in which the new group takes on the values and norms of the dominant culture

• WHile most immigrants to the US have gradually adopted the label of «American», scholars maintain that assimilation varies depending on access to opportunity

Question 11

Multiculturalism

Answer 11

À condition in which ethnic groups exist separately and share equally in economic and political life

• Multiculturalism calls for respecting cultural diversity and promoting the equality of different cultures

Question 12

Culture Shock

Answer 12

À state of disorientation from having lost familiar cultural references points and not yet knowing how to navigate in the new culture

Question 13

Ethnocentrism

Answer 13

The tendency to look at other cultures through the eyes of one’s own culture, and thereby misrepresent them.

Question 14

Cultural Relativism

Answer 14

The practice of judging a society by its own standards

Question 15

Instincts

Answer 15

Fixed patterns of behaviour that have genetic origins and that appear in all normal animals within a given species

Question 16

Global Growth

Answer 16

Many believe that the rapid worldwide growth of the Internet corresponds to a spread in values that echo European and North American cultures:

• Global communication
• Seemingly unlimited information
• Instant gratification

Question 17

Globalization

Answer 17

The reordering of time and distance in social life as our lives are influenced by events far removed from our everyday activities.

Question 18

Benefits of Globalization

Answer 18

Access to a variety of goods and foodstuffs

Question 19

Problems caused by globalization

Answer 19

Climate change, threat of terrorism, job loss

Question 20

Nationalism

Answer 20

À set of beliefs and symbols expressing identification with a national community.

Nationalism can be highly political, involving attempts to asset the power of a nation based on a shared ethnic or racial identity over people of a different ethnicity or race.

Question 21

Cultural Lag

Answer 21

The idea, introduced by WIlliam Ogburn, that changes in cultural values and norms take time to catch up with technological developments

For example, gene editing technology outpaced cultural values, so guidelines were developed to nativité ethical questions and prevent violation of shared values