Chp 2 Terms - Culture

Question 1

more

Answer 1

A core norm that most people believe is essential for the survival of their group or their society.

Question 2

norms

Answer 2

Generally accepted ways of doing things.

Question 3

production

Answer 3

The human capacity to make and use tools. It improves our ability to take what we want from nature.

Question 4

folkway

Answer 4

The least important type of norm-a norm that evokes the least severe punishment when violated.

Question 5

taboo

Answer 5

The strongest type of norm.
When someone violates a taboo, it causes revulsion in the community, and punishment is severe.

Question 6

symbols

Answer 6

Things that carry particular meanings, including the components of language, mathematical notations, and signs. Symbols allow us to classify experience and generalize from it.

Question 7

culture

Answer 7

The socially transmitted practices, languages, symbols, beliefs, values, ideologies, and material objects that people create to deal with real-life problems.

Question 8

abstraction

Answer 8

The human capacity to create general ideas or ways of thinking that are not linked to particular instances.

Question 9

cooperation

Answer 9

The human capacity to create a complex social life by sharing resources and working together.

Question 10

society

Answer 10

A number of people who interact, usually in a defined territory, and share a culture.

Question 11

subculture

Answer 11

A set of distinctive values, norms, and practices within a larger culture.

Question 12

countercultures

Answer 12

Subversive subcultures that oppose dominant values and seek to replace them.

Question 13

rationalization

Answer 13

The application of the most efficient means to achieve given goals and the unintended, negative consequences of doing so.

Question 14

consumerism

Answer 14

The tendency to define ourselves in terms of the goods and services we purchase.

Question 15

rights revolution

Answer 15

The process by which socially excluded groups have struggled to win equal rights under the law and in practice.

Question 16

cultural relativism

Answer 16

The belief that all cultures have equal value.

Question 17

postmodernism

Answer 17

Culture characterized by an eclectic mix of cultural elements from different times and places, the erosion of authority, and the decline of consensus around core values.

Question 18

rites of passage

Answer 18

Cultural ceremonies that mark the transition from one stage of life to another (e.g., baptisms, confirmations, weddings) or from life to death (e.g., funerals).

Question 19

multiculturalism

Answer 19

A federal government policy that promotes and funds the maintenance of culturally diverse communities, thus strengthening the trend toward cultural diversification.

Question 20

ethnocentrism

Answer 20

The tendency to judge other cultures exclusively by the standards of your own.

Question 21

rape culture

Answer 21

A culture in which sexual harassment, slut-shaming, the trivialization of rape, victim-blaming, and sexual assault are widespread, and, for large sections of the population, these actions seem normal.

Question 22

language

Answer 22

A system of symbols strung together to communicate thought.

Question 23

caste

Answer 23

Hereditary class authorized by religion

Question 24

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

Answer 24

Holds that we experience certain things in our environment and form concepts about those things. We then develop language to express our concepts. Finally, language itself influences how we see the world.

Question 25

subordinate culture

Answer 25

Contests dominant culture to varying degrees.

Question 26

popular culture (or mass culture)

Answer 26

Culture consumed by all classes.

Question 27

high culture

Answer 27

Culture consumed mainly by upper classes.

Question 28

dominant culture

Answer 28

Helps rich and powerful categories of people exercise control over others.

Question 29

material culture

Answer 29

The tools and techniques that enable people to accomplish tasks.