Introduction to

Sociology
What is Culture?
• Culture: The ways of thinking, the ways of acting, and material
objects that together form a people’s way of life.
• It includes both thoughts and things
• Nonmaterial Culture: It is the ideas created by members of a
society. It includes the words people use, their customs,
thoughts and beliefs.
• Material culture. It consists of physical things created by
members of a society such as furniture, automobiles,
buildings, technology etc.
What is Culture
• Common mistakes:
• What we think and feel is shaped by culture, however we often
wrongly describe this as human nature (biology).
• Given the extent of differences in culture, people view their own
way of life as ‘natural’ and may start judging others based on
their personal cultural standards.
• We often forget that humans act; animals behave.
• Culture Shock: Personal disorientation when experiencing an
unfamiliar way of life.
Culture, Nation, and Society
• Culture refers to the shared way of life
• Nation: It is a political entity, a territory with designated
borders, e.g. Pakistan, India, US.
• Society: It is the organized interaction of people who typically
live in a nation or some other specific territory
Elements of Culture
• All cultures have some elements that make them distinct.
These include:
• Symbols: Anything that carries a particular meaning
recognized by people who share a culture. E.g. ring in ring
finger of left hand.
• Language: The system of symbols that allows people to
communicate with one another. It is the key to cultural
transmission, the process by which one generation passes
culture to the next.
• Beliefs: Specific thoughts or ideas that people hold to be true.
E.g. qualified women can serve the country
Elements of Culture
• Values: Culturally defined standards that people use to
decide what is desirable, good and beautiful and that
serve as broad guidelines for social living.
• Values guide our judgements and behaviour e.g. people who
value physical fitness will exercise regularly and watch their
food and drink.
• Values change from time to time and place to place.
• When our values defined the admirable woman as dutiful,
domestic, and dependent, higher education for women was
discouraged; now we admire woman who are self-reliant,
independent, and successful, higher education for women is
encouraged.
Elements of Culture
• Norms: Rules and expectations by which a society guides the
attitude of its members.
• There are two types of norms
• Mores: Norms that are widely observed and have great moral
significance, include taboos (e.g. wearing clothes, not marrying
siblings). Mores guide distinction between right and wrong. Their
violation brings punishment.
• Folkways: Norms of routine and casual interaction (e.g. wearing a
tie on formal occasions, greeting). Folkways guide distinction
between right and rude. Violation is frowned upon but there is
usually no punishment.
• Norms make our dealings orderly and predictable and ensure
social control, attempts by society to regulate people’s
thoughts and actions.
Ideal and Real Culture
• Both values and norms tell how we should act. Ideal culture is
always different from reality.
• Ideal Culture: It includes the formally approved folkways and
mores which people are supposed to follow (cultural norms).
• Real Culture: It consists of those which they actually practise
(statistical norms).
Cultural Diversity
• Subculture: It includes cultural patterns that set apart a
certain segment of a society’s population, but not in a
conflicting manner.
• Subcultures not only involve difference but also hierarchy –
dominant/mainstream vs subculture.
• The rich have a life-style different from that of the poor.
• The adolescent culture has special styles of behaviour,
thought and dress.
• The subcultures in our society maybe based on occupation,
region, social class, age, gender, rural settings, urban settings
etc.
Cultural Diversity
• Counterculture: Subculture which is in active
opposition to the dominant culture is called
counterculture.
• It is an aspect of cultural diversity that is based on
outright rejection of conventional ideas or behaviour.
• The delinquent gang, for instance, is not a group with
no standards or moral values; it has very definite
standards and moral values, but these are quite
different from those of the rest of the society. E.g.
Taliban
• The counterculture rejects some but not all of the
norms of the dominant culture.
Culture Changes in Three Ways
• Invention: Creating new cultural elements
• Invention of smart phones and expansion of internet
• Discovery: Recognizing and better understanding of something
already in existence
• X-rays or DNA
• Diffusion: The spread of cultural traits from one society to another
• Rock music or much of the English language
Ethnocentrism and Cultural
Relativism
• Ethnocentrism: The practice of judging another culture by the
standards of one’s own culture.
• Cultural Relativism: The practice of judging a culture by its
own standards.
• Xenocentrism: It is the belief that our own products, styles, or
ideas are necessarily inferior to those which originate
elsewhere.
Theoretical Analysis of Culture
• Structural-Functional
• Culture is a complex strategy for meeting human needs.
• Cultural universals: Traits that are part of every known culture;
includes family, funeral rites, and jokes.

• Critical evaluation
• By focusing on dominant culture and stability, it ignores cultural
diversity and downplays the importance of change.
Inequality and Culture
• Social Conflict
• The link between culture and inequality such that cultural traits
benefit some members at the expense of others.
• Approach rooted in Karl Marx and materialism; society’s system
of material production has a powerful effect on the rest of the
culture.

• Critical evaluation
• By stressing the divisiveness of culture, this approach understates
the ways cultural patterns integrate members into society.
Applying Theory
Thank You

Questions?