Chapter 3 Flashcards
(27 cards)
Define culture
Everything humans create in establishing our relationships to nature and with each other.
Define society
The structure of relationships within which culture is created and shared through regularized patterns of social interaction.
Define cultural universals
A common practice or belief shared by all societies.
Define innovation
The process of introducing a new idea or object to a culture through discovery or invention.
Define discovery
The process of uncovering or revealing an existing aspect of reality.
Define invention
The combination of existing cultural artifacts to create something new.
Define diffusion
The process by which a cultural item spreads from group to group or society to society.
Define material culture
Our physical modification of the natural environment to suit our purposes.
Example of material culture
Consumer goods
Define cognitive culture
Our mental and symbolic representations of reality.
Example of cognitive culture
Language
Define normative culture
Consist of the ways we establish, abide by, and enforce principles of conduct.
Example of normative culture
Laws
Define norms
An established standard of behavior maintained by a society.
Define folkways
Norms governing everyday behavior, whose violation raises comparatively little concern.
Define mores
Norms deemed highly necessary to the welfare of a society.
Define formal norms
A norm that generally has been written down and that specifies strict punishments for violators.
Define laws
Formal norms enforced by the state.
Define informal norm
A norm that is generally understood by not precisely recorded.
Define sanction
A penalty or reward for conduct concerning a social norm.
Define dominant ideology
A set of cultural beliefs and practices that legitimates existing powerful social, economic, and political interests.
Define subculture
A segment of society that shares a distinctive pattern of mores, folkways, and values that differs from the pattern of the larger society.
Define argot
Specialized language used by members of a group or subculture.
Define counterculture
A subculture that deliberately opposes certain aspects of the larger culture.