Lecture 1: Nature, Culture, Subject

Question 1

Nature

Answer 1

Does not directly refer here to distinguishing nature and nurture at an individual level. Nature here refers to ‘human biology’- that is approaching the human organism within its ecology and as part of an evolutionary history. The natural sciences (mainly biology) are most appropriate here.

Question 2

Culture

Answer 2

Refers to the development of a specifically human ecology which is characterized by ‘joint intentionality’ and ‘symbolic interaction’ and is part of a cultural history which is traditionally referred to as ‘civilization’.
The humanities (anthropology, sociology, political economy) are most appropriate here.

Question 3

Subject

Answer 3

Refers to the undeniable first-person experience that emerges from the birth of a new human organism (nature) into a pre-existing world (culture). It is part of the individual live history. Phenomenology, existentialism and life stories are most appropriate here.

Question 4

‘first nature’

Answer 4

The influence of human evolutionary history on individual development.

Question 5

‘second nature’

Answer 5

The influence of human cultural history on individual development.

Question 6

Nurture

Answer 6

The specific ways in which the direct environment in which we are born shapes us into an individual (interaction of first and second nature).

Question 7

Joint intentionality

Answer 7

A concept used (by Tomasello) to describe a uniquely human evolutionary adaptation. It implies that humans are extremely attuned to sharing their intentions and working towards joint intentions. This sets the stage for forms of intensive cooperation far surpassing that of other mammals.

Question 8

Conventional cultural practices

Answer 8

A concept used for a second step in evolution, in which humans are starting to understand themselves as part of a shared community of ‘us’. Cultural traditions are distinguished from behavioral traditons. In the latter useful behaviors are learned, but only in the first conventions (that may not have direct use) are transmitted over generations. This allows for much more complex symbolic interaction and sets the stage for cultural development (and intergroup conflict).

Question 9

‘symbolic order’

Answer 9

Concept referring to the fact that the world into which we are born is not simply a natural ‘umwelt’, but structured by the symbolic interactions over the generations which have shaped a particular pre-formed understanding of the world that shapes our world-understanding and our ‘being-in-the-world’.

Question 10

Schema

Answer 10

A particular memory-pattern resulting from nurture (learning history, interaction of first and second nature), which pre-structures our understanding of new situations.

Question 11

The psychological self

Answer 11

“The psychological self may be construed as a reflexive arrangement of the subjective “I” and the constructed “Me,” evolving and expanding over the human life course. “. The subjective I refers to the phenomenological first-person perspective. The constructed ‘me’ refers to what is made of the person in the interactions with the world. The reflexive arrangement refers to the bi-directional proces in which the construction is shaped by the first-person self-awareness AND how this first-person self-awareness is shaped by the constructions.

Question 12

Actor

Answer 12

It portrays the human being as an actor on the social stage of life. Temperamental features result in typical interactional patterns with others that can be interpreted as agentic and communal strivings and that result in the stable patterns known as the BIG 5 traits.
–> psychosocial problem; self-regulation
–> temporal emphasis; present
–> developmental emergence: 2-3, early childhood

Question 13

Agent

Answer 13

The toddler starts to envision him or herself as having certain aims, goals, desires and means. In the ‘actor’ stage the behaviors associated with those strivings were present and interpreted by others, but now the toddler starts to understand them as óf him or herself.
–> psychosocial problem; self-esteem
–> temporal emphasis; present and future
–> developmental emergence: 7-9, mid-to-late childhood

Question 14

Author

Answer 14

Here individual identity is shaped by a larger individual narrative (life story) with a past, present and anticipated future. Self-understanding now means to see oneself as being shaped by the past and as anticipating the future in understanding the present. The individual narrative is not pure individual, but a copy-paste and adaptationist version of big and small stories internalized from the broader cultural surroundings.
–> psychosocial problem; self-continuity
–> temporal emphasis; past, present and future
–> developmental emergence: 15-25, adolescence and emerging adulthood

Question 15

What are 4 common mistakes and confusions

Answer 15

1. Naturalising cultural categories
2. Reducing every aspect to cultural narratives
3. Forgetting about the cultural and subjective position from where the author speaks
4. Treating all accounts as equally subjective opinions

Question 16

What are the 2 steps of an organism in nature

Answer 16

1. Obligate collaborative foraging; humans have developed very strong skills to collaborate with each other; joint intentionality and intersubjectivity; humans are from birth attuned to sharing mental states with others
   –> within this context shared meanings and stories can come into existence
2. Group-mindedness; humans also develop the capacity for conventions (= rules that you learn to belong to a certain group; eg. you learn words and rules to be able to speak a certain language and to belong to a group pf English-speaking people); in this, humans are introduced into a pre-existing symbolic order (= the universe of signs and meanings typical for human societies)

Question 17

episodic future thought

Answer 17

= anticipating the outcome of goals and imagining potential future personal episodes

Question 18

autobiographical reasoning

Answer 18

= interpretive operations through which people draw on autobiographical memories to make inferences about who they are and what their lives mean

Question 19

master narrative (of a culture)

Answer 19

= fundamental journeys and conflicts that its people have traditionally faced

Question 20

What are 3 perennial problems for the self

Answer 20

1. Self-regulation and the Social Actor; learning to control one’s performance
2. Self-esteem and the Motivated Agent; the self’s relative success or failure as a motivated agent who strives to achieve goals in valued domains of life
3. Self-continuity and the Autobiographical Actor; how is the self the same and different across certain (social) situations

Question 21

what are 2 kinds of continuity

Answer 21

1. phenomenological continuity = basic, moment-to-moment feeling that “I” continues to exist as the same locus of feeling, thought and consciousness
2. narrative continuity = constructed sense of self as a character in different scenes that comprise a story (past and future)

Question 22

what 4 things influence the experiences and acts of a person in the present

Answer 22

• context
• development (past)
• goals and motivation (future)
• person

Question 23

explain history and narratives

Answer 23

human groups get cultural histories due to the continued transmission of conventions; cultures develop oral and then written traditions and stories about who “we” are and who “we” came to be; by telling these stories and reflecting on them we change our understanding of who we are

Question 24

explain the emergence of schemata

Answer 24

universal human nature (collaboration and group-mindedness)
–> particular cultural histories
and
–> individual life stories / nurture, learning history
–> leads to –> schemata

Question 25

what are 2 kinds of goals when it comes to the self as an agent

Answer 25

1. avoidance-prevention goals = social vigilance and caution; trying to receive no harm, achieving security and social harmony
2. approach-promotion goals = may suggest personal entrepeneurship and the uninhibited pursuit of self-fulfillment