Lesson 3. The Self According to Sociology and Anthropology

• Sociology and Anthropology

  Two interrelated disciplines that contributes to the understanding of self.

   
• Sociology

  -presents the self as a product of modern society.

  -it is the science that studies the development. Structure, interaction, and collective behavior of human being.

   
• Anthropology

  The study of humanity.

  this field takes an interdisciplinary approach to looking athuman culture, both past and present.

   
• George Herbert Mead 

  Ø He is an American philosopher, sociologist, and psychologist.

  Ø He argued that the self like the mind is social emergent.

  Ø He claimed that the self is something which undergoes development because it is not present instantly at birth.

  Ø The self, arises in the process of social experience and activity as a result of their relations to other individuals within the process.

   
• Stages of Self-formation

  Social emergence of self is developed due to the three forms of inter-subjective activity, the (1) language, (2) play, and the (3) game.
• Preparatory Stage (Birth - 2 Years Old)

  At this stage, children’s behaviors are primarily based on imitation.

  At his stage, knowing and understanding the symbols are important for this will constitute their way of communicating with others throughout their lives.
• The Play Stage (2-6 Years Old)

  Children begin to role play and pretend to be other people.

  Role-taking in the play stage is the process of mentally assuming the process of another person to see how this person might behave or respond in a given situation (Schefer, 2012).

  It is a stage where the child widens his perspective and realizes that he is not alone and that there are others around him whose presence he has to consider.
•  The Game Stage (6-9 Years Old)

  The child begins to consider several tasks and various types relationships simultaneously.

  The child now begins to see the perspective of other.

  The child has now the ability to respond to several members of social environment
• Generalized others

  The perspective and expectations of a network of others (or society in general) that a child learns and takes into account when shaping his/her behavior.
• Mead’s two phases or components of self (dual nature of the self) the phase which reflects the attitude of the generalized other or “me”;

  the phase that responds to the attitude of generalized other or the “I”

   
• me - the phase which reflects the attitude of the generalized other.
• I -  the phase that responds to the attitude of generalized other or the
• Me - "the social self"
• I - "is a response to the “me”"
• “Me” – a conventional, habitual individual. This are the characteristics behavior, and actions done by a person that follows the “generalized others”. The self is the objective self.
• "I" - the novel reply of the individual to generalized order. It is the reaction of the indvidual to the attitudes of others, as well as the manifestation of the individuality of the person. The self is active.
• Georg Simmel

  He was a German Sociologist, philosopher, and critic.

  He was intensely interested in the ways in which modern, objective culture impacts the indvidual's subjective experiences.
• In contrast to Mead, Simmel proposed that there is something called human nature that is innate to the individual. This human nature is intrinsic to the individual like the natural inclination to religious impulse or the gender differences. He also added that most of our social interactions are individual motivation
• Objective culture is made up of elements that become separated from the individual or group’s control and identified as separate objects.
• Urbanization is the process that moves people from country to city living. This result to the concentration of population in one place brought about by industrialization. This paved way to the organization of labor or increased division of labor, which demands specializations wherein this creates more objective culture.
• Simmel also stressed that the consumption of products has an individuating and trivializing effect because this enables the person to create self out of things. By consumption, an individual able to purchase things that can easily personalized or express the self. People used commodities to create self-concept and self-image.
• Simmel also said that products used in the modernity to express and produced the self is also changing. It becomes more and more separated from subjectivity(subjective culture) due to division of labor and market economy.
• Money creates a universal value system wherein every commodity can be understood. Money also increases individual freedom by pursuing diverse activities and by increasing the options for self-expression.

   
• Additionally, money also discouraged intimate ties with people. Money comes to stand in the place of almost everything – and this includes relationship! Money further discourages intimate ties by encouraging a culture of calculation.
• On the other hand, in the modern urban settings, group membership is due to rational motivation or membership due to freedom of choice. This characterized the secondary group which is goal and utilitarian oriented, with a narrow range of activities, over limited time spans.
• As a result, it is more likely that an individual will develop unique personalities. Moreover, Simmel said that a complex web of group affiliations produces role conflicts and blasé attitude.Role conflict is a situation that demands a person of two or more roles that clash with one another. Blasé attitude is an attitude of absolute boredom and lack of concern. This is the inability or limited ability to provide emotional investment to other people.

   
• Blasé attitude is an attitude of absolute boredom and lack of concern. This is the inability or limited ability to provide emotional investment to other people.

   
• 4 Sub fields of Anthropology

  Archeology

  Biological Anthropology,

  Linguistics

  Cultural Anthropology
• Archeology - v Focus on the study of the past and how it may have contributed to the present ways of how people conduct their daily lives.
• Biological Anthropology - Focus on how the human body adapts to the different earth environments
• • Linguistic Anthropology Focused on using language as means to discover a group’s manner of social interaction and their worldview
• • Cultural AnthropologyFocused in knowing what makes one group’s manner of living forms an essential part of the member’s personal and societal identity
• Symbols - These are the words, gestures, pictures or objects that have recognized or accepted meaning in a particular culture.

   

  Example: colors have similar meaning across all cultures
• Heroes

  These are persons from the past or present who have characteristics that are important in culture. They may be real of work of fictions.

   

  Example: Fiction – Thor, Captain America; Real – Jose Rizal, Apolinario Mabini
• Rituals

  These are activities participated by a group of people for the fulfilment of desired objectives and are concerned to be socially essential.

   

  Example: Wedding (muslim, Christian) fiesta, Christmas celebration, graduation, etc
• Values 

  These are considered to be the core of every culture. These are unconscious, neither discuss or observed, and can only be inferred from the way people act and react to situations.

   

  Example: hospitality, respect for elders etc
• Anthropology offers another way by which a person can view themselves. As self is formed or determined by the past and present condition, by biological characteristics, the communication and language use, and the lifestyle we choose to live.
• Clifford Geertz was an Anthropology Professor at the University of Chicago. He studied different cultures and explored on the conception of the self in his writings entitled, “The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man” (1966) in his fieldwork at Java, Bali and Morrocco.
• The analysis of Geertz (1966) in his cultural study about the description of self in Bali is that the Balinese person is extremely concerned not to present anything individual (distinguishing him or her from others) in social life but to enact exclusively a culturally prescribed role or mask. 
• Clifford Geertz - was an Anthropology Professor at the University of Chicago. He studied different cultures and explored on the conception of the self in his writings entitled, “The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man” (1966) in his fieldwork at Java, Bali and Morrocco.