UCSP Lesson 3 Socialization and Enculturation

• Anthropologists coined the term enculturation to denote the process by which an individual learns the culture that is prevailing around him or her.
• Sociologists on the other hand, define socialization as the conditioning process that begins in childhood and involves internalizing symbols, rituals, expectations, rules, and requirements not only related to the society as a whole but also for every specific required speech and behavior within the whole.
• a "ready-made" culture is taught to them first and foremost by their parents and eventually by other agencies such as the school, church, and the government. Thus, socialization is "a lifelong process of learning and relearning where individuals develop a self-concept and prepare for roles which in turn shape his or her personality."


  Socialization
• 1922, Charles Horton Cooley developed the Looking-Glass Self Theory to explain how a child develops the ability to grasp the role and attitudes of other persons and visualize himself or herself through the eyes of others, acquiring what he or she calls the "social self". 
• Three Step in Looking-glass self

  a.1. An individual in a social situation imagines how they appear to others;

  a.2. That individual imagines others’ judgements of that appearance; and

  a.3. The individual develops feelings about and respond to those perceived judgements.
• Like Cooley, George Herbert Mead also believed that one's sense of self is developed through social interaction.

  The "I" and the "me"
• Initially an infant sees himself or herself as his or her own universe. He or she does not care what other people would think of him or her as he or she still lacks the ability to think of the perspective of the other person.


  This is the time that he or she refers to himself or herself as the “I”
• as he or she grows older the perception of how other people think about him or her becomes more important.


  the "me"
• The preparatory stage of the "I" and the "me" is when the child sees themselves in the image of their parents.
• Prekindergarten children often think and act like the people they often see.
• During the preparatory stage, the child does not engage in social interaction.
• The play stage of the "I" and the "me" is when children ages five to eight assume the role of others.
• From simple imitation, children start to act out roles and interact with other children during the play stage.
• The final phase, game stage", is what Mead also calls the period of "generalized others" with reference to the society as a whole.
• At the game stage, children understand that they should not only act based on what they see from others, but what the society expects from them.
• Children have the ability to understand multiple roles or sub-identities each one must take in a society during the game stage.
• The term "total institutions" was coined in 1961 by Erving Goffman. Therefore, total institutions have the ability to resocialize people either voluntarily or involuntarily.