Chapter 6

Social Identity, Personality, and Gender

Chapter Preview

• What Is Enculturation?• How Does Enculturation Influence

Personality? • Are Different Personalities Characteristic of

Different Cultures?

Thursday December 5, 2013• OBJ: SWBAT determine where we get our

culture from, and what a naming ceremony is by reflecting on their own names.

• Drill: How do we learn our culture?• Homework: Take Name Quiz home.

What Is Enculturation?

• Enculturation is the process by which culture is passed from one generation to the next and through which individuals become members of their society.

• Enculturation begins soon after birth with the development of self-awareness.

How Does Enculturation Influence Personality?

• Each individual begins with certain broad potentials and limitations that are genetically inherited.

• In some cultures, particular childrearing practices seem to promote the development of compliant personalities.

• In others different practices seem to promote more independent, self-reliant personalities.

Are Different Personalities Characteristic of Different Cultures?• Every culture emphasizes certain personality traits as

good and others as bad. • The concept of modal personality recognizes that any

human society has a range of individual personalities, but some will be more typical than others.

• Since modal personalities may differ from one culture to another and since cultures may differ in the range of variation they will accept, it is clear that abnormal personality is a relative concept.

The Jungle Book and Cub Scouts

• In 1916 the international Boy Scout movement expanded to include younger boys in a “cub scout” program inspired by Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book (1894).

• Kipling wrote the story about a young boy in India named Mowgli being raised by a wolf as one of her own cubs.

Question

• Enculturation is the process of transmittingA. society from one generation to the

next.B. society norms from one adult to

another.C. culture from one child to another.D. culture from one generation to the

next.E. personality from parent to child.

Answer: D

• Enculturation is the process of transmitting culture from one generation to the next.

Question

• The agents of enculturationA. are persons involved in transmitting culture to

the next generation.B. are at first the members of the family into

which the child is born.C. vary, depending on the structure of the family

into which a child is born.D. include peer groups and school teachers.E. all of these choices

Answer: E

• The agents of enculturation are persons involved in transmitting culture to the next generation, are at first the members of the family into which the child is born, vary, depending on the structure of the family into which a child is born and include peer groups and school teachers.

The Self and the Behavioral Environment

• Culture is created and learned rather than biologically inherited.

• All societies must ensure that culture is transmitted from one generation to the next.

• Enculturation begins soon after birth.

Self Awareness

• The ability to:– Identify oneself as an object.– React to oneself.– Appraise or evaluate oneself.

• Attaching positive value to the self ensures individuals act to their own advantage.

Requirements for Self-awareness

• Object orientation– Aware of the world of objects other than

self.• Spatial orientation

– The ability to get from one object, or place, to another.

Requirements for Self-awareness

• Temporal orientation– Able to connect past actions with those in

the present and future.• Normative orientation

– Understanding of cultural values, ideals, and standards.

Visual Counterpoint

• Self-awareness is not restricted to humans. This chimpanzee knows that the individual in the mirror is himself and not some other chimp, just as the girl recognizes herself.

Naming Ceremony

• A special event or ritual to mark the naming of a child.

Where did your Name Come From?

• Fill out the Name Questionnaire• If you feel comfortable when we are done we

will share these.

Yaruba Naming Ceremony• The Yaruba people are a tribe that live in

Nigeria.• Yoruba people do not pick names for their

children before they are born. The child's name is selected on the basis of a significant event or circumstance at the time of their birth

• For example a Yoruba child born in America might receive Olatubokun as a name. Olatubokun means "It is time for my honor to come back home."

Yaruba Naming Ceremony• After a baby is born a naming ceremony

performed. In the naming ceremony many symbols are used.

Yaruba Naming Ceremony• that a piece of

money is held up and if the child reaches out and grabs the money the child will have wealth.

Yaruba Naming Ceremony

• child is given a very small piece to eat of meat. The piece of meat represents nature's bounty.

Yaruba Naming Ceremony• Water is dabbed on the

child's face, this represents the cleansing forces of life. Oil representing calm in periods of travail is dabbed on the face. The child is given a taste of salt and sugar, these are used to improve taste and therefore bring pleasantness to life..

Yaruba Naming Ceremony• The child is given a

taste of cola nut, this represents longevity because a cola nut does not fall from the tree until it is fully ripe. Ginger represents good health and the child is gives a piece to taste. After the ceremony, there is a party and a feast.

• Identify similarities or differences between how they were named and their naming celebration and how a Yoruba child is named and a Yoruba naming celebration.

Friday December 6, 2013• Objective: SWBAT compare naming

ceremonies from different tribes by watching a video and using their notes.

• Drill: Why are names an important part of any culture?

• HW: None

Answer

• It is a big stage in enculturation and self awareness.

Naming Ceremony

• During the movie take notes on the preparation of the naming ceremony,

• How are jobs distributed?• What types of symbols are they collecting?

What do they mean.• Compare this to the naming ceremonies we

discussed yesterday.

First Laugh Ceremony

• Navajo babies begin to learn the importance of community at a special First Laugh Ceremony (Chi Dlo Dil).

• The person who prompted an infant’s first laugh teaches the little child about the joy of generosity by helping the baby give symbolic gifts of sweets and rock salt to each guest.

Behavior Environment

• Dark and foreboding to outsiders, the Ituri forest in the tropical heart of Africa is viewed with affection by the Mbuti foragers who live there.

• In their eyes, it is like a benevolent parent, providing them with all they ask for: sustenance, protection, and security.

Personality

• Refers to the distinctive ways a person thinks, feels, and behaves.

• Most anthropologists believe adult personality is shaped by early childhood experiences.

• The economy helps structure the way children are raised and this influences their adult personalities.

Two Patterns of Child Rearing

• Dependence training - promotes compliance in and favors keeping individuals within the group.

• Independence training - emphasizes individual independence, self-reliance, and personal achievement.

Ju/’hoansi Society

• In traditional Ju/’hoansi society, fathers as well as mothers show great indulgence to children, who do not fear or respect men more than women.

Modal Personality

• The modal personality of a group is defined as the body of character traits that occur with the highest frequency in a culturally bounded population.

• Modal personality is a statistical concept.• It opens up for investigation the questions of

how societies organize diversity and how diversity relates to culture change.

National Character Studies

• Focused on the modal characteristics of modern countries.

• Many anthropologists believe national character theories are based on unscientific and overgeneralized data.

Monday December 16, 2013

• Obj: SWBAT understand how geography has determined how cultures have become industrialized.

• Drill:

Core Values

• The collectively shared core values of Chinese culture promote integration of the individual into a larger group, as we see in this gathering of Hong Kong residents doing Tai Chi together.

Cohabitation

Intersexuals

• People born with reproductive organs, genitalia, and/or sex chromosomes that are not exclusively male or female.

Transgenders

• People who cross-over or occupy a culturally accepted intermediate position in the binary male—female gender construction.

Sadhus

• Shaivite sadhu of the Aghori sub-sect drinks from human skull bowl, a daily reminder of human mortality.

• To become a sadhu, one must transform his personal identity, leave his place in the social order, and surrender all attachments to normal human pleasures.

Question

• The standards that define normal behavior for any culture

A. are determined by that culture itself.

B. result from a combination of cultural mores and neurological hardwiring.

C. are a function of child rearing practices and religion.

D. are similar from culture-to-culture, and are thus fairly standard across the spectrum.

E. are easily codifiable.

Answer: A

• The standards that define normal behavior for any culture are determined by that culture itself.

Ethnic Psychoses

• Mental disorders specific to particular ethnic groups.

Ethnic Psychoses And Other Culture-bound Syndromes

Disorder Culture Description

AmokMalaya (also

in Java, Africa, and Tierra del

Fuego)

Sudden outbursts of aggression in which the afflicted person

may kill or injure others.

Anorexia nervosa

Western countries

Disorder in which a preoccupation with thinness produces a refusal to eat.

Ethnic Psychoses And Other Culture-bound Syndromes

Disorder Culture Description

Latah MalayFear reaction in middle-aged

women of low intelligence who are subservient.

KoroSoutheast

Asia

Fear reaction in which the person fears his penis will withdraw into

his abdomen and he will die.

Ethnic Psychoses And Other Culture-bound Syndromes

Disorder Culture Description

Windigo

Algonquian Indians of

Canada and northern

U.S.

A hunter becomes convinced that he is

bewitched.

Kitsunetsuki Japan

Victims believe they are possessed by foxes and

change facial expressions to resemble foxes.

Ethnic Psychoses And Other Culture-bound Syndromes

Disorder Culture Description

Pibloktoq and other

Arctic hysterias

Circumpolar peoples from

Lapland eastward across Siberia,

northern Alaska, and Canada to

Greenland

Victim may tear clothes off, jump in water or fire, roll in

snow, try to walk on the ceiling, throw things, thrash

about, and “speak in tongues.”

Question

• Ethnic psychoses are

A. biological mental disorders which are classified in clinical studies of mental health disorders.

B. are mental disorders specific to particular ethnic groups.

C. used to define differences between sane and insane behaviors consistently.

D. invalid as classification systems.

E. often revealed on daytime televisions shows.

Answer: B

• Ethnic psychoses are mental disorders specific to particular ethnic groups.