Chapter 2- Historical and Cultral Aspect

Question 1

Describe the multiple dimensions and meanings of culture. (5)

Answer 1

• Value= internalized criteria by that is used to select and judge goals and behaviour in society
• Beliefs= conception of the world and what is true
• Norms= expected behaviour in specific social situations
• Customs= typical way of doing
• Knowledge

Question 2

Describe aging in Canada’s multicultural society. (3)

Answer 2

• Increasingly heterogeneous
• Cultural fabric of aging must be considered with policies and programs
• Culture, language, and religious differences create unique challenges for health and health-care policy

Question 3

What are the research methods gerontologists use to understand the cultural basis of aging? (4)

Answer 3

• Historical comparison of early with later
• Comparison of two or more similar societies in the same time
• Eastern and Western
• Developed and developing

Question 4

Explain intersectionality (2)

Answer 4

• How minority group status and marginilization shapes experiences and identity
• Disadvantage and privilege are tied to intersection of multiple inequalities in life course and social structures

Question 5

Describe the Modernization Hypothesis (3)

Answer 5

• Documents societal changes that came as a result of IR
• Two societies existed before (hunter-gather, agrarian), oldest members were valued for knowledge and had higher status
• As modernization and IR occurred, status was reduced because of technology, increase of work, and urban migration

Question 6

What are the criticisms of the Modernization Hypothesis? (6)

Answer 6

• Heterogeneity in status decline after modernization
• Lower status of older people in some pre-industrial societies
• Continued/increased high status in modern societies
• Alternative reasons exist (responsibility from family to gov’t)
• Regional diversity
• Other intersecting factors

Question 7

Describe aging in preliterate societies and how it changed. (4)

Answer 7

• No formal education, knowledge and beliefs were carried by elders
• Elders had many roles
• Less valued in nomadic tribes (migrated for food), more more valued with viable food production or religion
• Written knowledge replaced oral transmission, lowered elder status