Material/Symbolic Culture

Material and Symbolic culture is present in any given society. Material culture reflects the physical aspect of civilization and the common artifacts and objects used in their society. Symbolic culture, however, takes on a much more broad definition; it essentially encompasses everything material culture does not. Symbolic culture can range from the language and gestures used in a society to its values and beliefs. In American society, material culture has turned into somewhat of an obsession. Specifically, in the technology craze, many individuals feel the need to keep all of their technological accessories up to date. The smartphone, specifically the iPhone, is an excellent example of material culture as it demonstrates the extent to which technology is integrated into our society; smartphones can configure ones home security, pinpoint the phones location from anywhere in the world and access the vastness of the internet all from the flick of a fingertip. This directly coincides with our symbolic culture as it demonstrates not only American's need for control but also the importance of prioritization and scheduling. Smartphones are often used to keep track of an individuals daily schedule by keeping appointments and specific information; smartphones can also communicate with anyone from nearly any location in the world and can be used to make rapid changes throughout one's daily life. Advances such as these contribute the overall on-the-go lifestyle of Americans and demonstrate the prominent connection between material and non material culture.

Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism is often a prevalent component in many cultures, especially that of America. In AP Psychology ethnocentrism is attributed to an evolutionary theory in behavior where early human ancestors had to quickly distinguish between friend and foe, thus forming an ingroup (group one belongs with) and outgroup (group one does not belong too) bias, this then severely limited the acceptance of diversity. Ethnocentrism has since been ingrained in the human psyche and is much easier to apply than to avoid. Early last year I had an Indian girl in my APUSH class who said she already had her marriage arranged with a boy she has never met. Given that my own family and culture ideals stress marriage with someone I feel a deep emotional connection too, an arranged marriage to me seemed like a very callous move by the parents and a flaw within her own culture. I had not noticed it at the time, but the girl was not the least bit bothered by the fact of an arranged marriage. I attempted to put myself in her shoes but that only resulted in anger and protest. I projected my own cultural ideals onto the girl and was oblivious to the fact that her values were far different from mine. I have since learned to accept values and ideals that are different from my own and have strayed away from ethnocentrism.

Sociological Perspective

Through ones sociological imagination we can see how historical and modern events have impacted the lives of individuals in society. This most definitely applies to my own life as while I was growing up in Ukraine the economic hardships in the country made it an unfavorable environment to raise a child in and as a result, my family and I moved to the US. Although most individuals were experiencing difficult times in the country, just the simple fact of a negative economy impacted the entire course of my families life. This has influenced my sociological mindfulness as it has made me more acute to the changes in the world and how they may impact individual lives. It has also made me much more grateful for the life I am currently living considering just how quickly the conditions can change. My parents decision to move has also impacted my social construction of reality as it made me realize just how quickly social institutions and foundations can fall apart when the majority of the population is severely impacted. Thus this one event has impacted my own view of society and made me realize just how fragile its foundations really are.

Week of September 2nd

This week in school my english class visited the college career center for the purpose of discussing  college applications and what we should expect from the admission process. Sitting in that room and listening to the counselor speak of college and stressing the importance of applying early I realized just how quickly high school has passed. It seems like no more than a year ago I was a freshman walking through the halls, confounded by the vastness on the school. Now I am a senior with a mere 7 months left until graduation. While it may be true that highschool and college are said to be the best years of one's life, I was in no way warned at just how quickly these years pass by. I hope the college years do not go by at nearly the same rate as highschool and I have time to savor in the moments of this relatively stress free youth

Doing Absolutely Nothing

I chose to do the "Doing Nothing" assignment during lunch in the wood commons. I felt lunch provided an optimum location for this assignment as it has a high volume of people and is a very social environment, thus doing absolutely nothing in an area where people are constantly occupied would be interesting experience. Sitting in my lunch table, I completely froze for 10minutes in the middle of the period. I did not inform my friends I was doing this, thereby when they noticed I was completely unreactive they started screaming my name and poking at me. I felt very uncomfortable at first and was extremely tempted to respond to their inquiries, but I kept trying at the silence. I tried to ignore their yelling and observed the rest of the lunch room. Given that today is the Freshman Mixer we had some kind of contest going on at lunch and whoever won received a pizza party. I looked on as those in the contest were attempting to complete the challenges. The people that were involved looked as they were having a very enjoyable time with the challenges provided. The first challenge consisted of keeping a balloon from hitting the ground by bouncing it on top of one's head until the finish line was reached. As I observed the people watching the game, I noticed they looked to be having just as much fun looking at the game as those who were in it. I concluded that in some way the entertainment those playing the game were experiencing was somehow projected onto those watching the games and allowed them to share in the fun. I managed to last 8 minutes during this assignment as I felt obligated to answer when one of my friends asked for help on a homework assignment. In total I thought this assignment provided a unique experience that I have normally not been asked of during school. At first I felt a need to start talking as by being in such a loud environment made silence feel cumbersome. However, as soon I became occupied by watching the games it became fairly interesting to observe the people and the environment around me and this experience became a unique one.