Chapter 3

Question 1

What is the definition of culture

Answer 1

Culture is the way people see life and live it.
It is supra organic, meaning it lives beyond the individual.
Culture also changes over time

Question 2

What is Dominant Culture

Answer 2

the culture that is able to impose it’s values, language, and ways of behaving on a given society

Because of their political and economic power,

Question 3

What are Dominants

Answer 3

people who are closely linked with the cultural mainstream

-they influence society

Question 4

What are Subcultures

Answer 4

minority cultures that differ from the dominant culture but don’t directly oppose it

(ex.groups organized around occupations or hobbies)

Question 5

What are Countercultures

Answer 5

minority cultures that feel the power of the dominant culture and exist in opposition to it

(ex.clothing styles or sexual norms, hippies, biker gangs) Counter (opposite) of the dominant culture

Question 6

What is High Culture

Answer 6

the culture of the elite, a distinct minority

eg.theatre, opera, ballet, and classical music, golf

(things that are only affordable by the rich)

Question 7

What is Popular Culture

Answer 7

the culture of the majority, especially those who do not have power

Question 8

What is the meaning Agency

Answer 8

the ability for us people to be creative or productive with materials given by the dominant culture

Question 9

what is Mass Culture

Answer 9

When big companies and powerful governments dictate what people buy, watch, wear, value, and believe

Question 10

What is Simulacra

Answer 10

stereotypical cultural images produced and reproduced like material goods or commodities by the media

Question 11

What is decipherment

Answer 11

Examining a text to discover it’s true meaning and to discover the intent of the individual/organization that produced it

Question 12

What is reading

Answer 12

when people treat what is provided by the culture industry as a resource and interpret it in ways not intended by the creators of it

Question 13

what are norms

Answer 13

standards of behaviour that are expected of members of a group, society, or culture

Question 14

Positive sanction

Answer 14

Ways of rewarding people for following the norms of society

Question 15

Negative sanction

Answer 15

ways of punishing people who go against cultural/societal norms

eg.isolating, laughing at, or shaming someone

Question 16

Folkways

Answer 16

Norms that govern day to day manners and should not be violated
(ex.double dipping ships, taking food out of the garbage)

Question 17

Mores

Answer 17

Norms that are more serious than folkways and MUST not be violated eg.rape, killing someone, stealing

Question 18

Taboo

Answer 18

A norm so deeply ingrained in our mind that the Meer though of it is sickening ex.cannibalism, child pornography, etc.

Question 19

What are Symbols

Answer 19

they are cultural items that hold significance for a culture. They can either be tangible (materialistic) or intangible (un-materialistic)
They change over time

Question 20

What are Values

Answer 20

the Standards/qualities such as goodness, beauty, and justice in a culture

Question 21

Difference between Ideal culture and Actual culture

Answer 21

Ideal culture is what people believe in (eg.environmentalism) and Actual culture is what really exists (eg.driving large SUV’s

Question 22

Ethnocentrism

Answer 22

the belief that a culture (usually of his/her own) is the absolute standard by which other cultures should be judged. It is often the product of ignorance.

Question 23

Eurocentrism

Answer 23

The belief that “European” culture is superior to other cultures

Question 24

What is cultural globalization and what is an example

Answer 24

It is the intensification and expansion of cultural flows across the globe
Example: the Americanization around the world

Question 25

Cultural Relativism

Answer 25

studying and understanding another culture and not just understanding individual concepts, but the whole system of the culture

Question 26

What is Presentism

Answer 26

The inability to judge figures of the past within their own time and instead judging them by todays standards

Question 27

what is sociolinguistics

Answer 27

It is the study of languages as part of culture

Question 28

What is Linguistic Determinism

Answer 28

it suggests that the way we view and understand the world is shaped by the language we speak

Question 29

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis

Answer 29

The theory that the structure of a language determines a persons perception and experience.
The view that language and culture have a unique relationship in each society