Understanding the Self

• are a major contributor to and reflection of our identities.

  Our possessions
• suggest that the environment surroundings affects what we think we need versus to what we really need.

  The Material self
• Material possessions and maintenance of particular lifestyles.

  The material self
• Identities can be reflected on the possessions that people have

  Material Self
• People are likely to purchase products that can relate to their ______.

  personality
• It tells a lot about their owners

  Possessions
• Factors in deciding what items/ services to purchase:

  financial constraints, availability of items and services, and the influence of family and friends
• Important Factor to Determine:

  Wants and Needs
• Factors to Consider in Acquiring Material Goods

  Utility and Significance
• Synonymous with luxuries

  Wants
• These are importants for survival.

  Needs
• Concerned with how things serve a practical purpose.

  Utility
• Concerned with the meaning assigned to the object.

  Significance
• French theorist, was one of the first to observe the relationship that people have with objects, and in particular looked at the objects as signs or things which could be decoded to convey messages beyond their practical value.

  Roland Barthes
• He popularized the field of Semiology


  Roland Barthes
• the study of objects as signs

  Semiology
• It is anything that conveys meaning.

  Sign
• objects function as signifiers that construct a meaning and carry a message.

  Semiotic analysis
• the role of possessions are treated ritually and after death.

  Anthropologically
• Theory of the Meaning of Material Possession

  Instrumental functions, social symbolic, categorical functions, and self-expression functions
• Functional properties of a product.

  Instrumental functions
• Function signifies personal qualities, social standing

  Social symbolic
• Material possessions may be used to communicate group membership or status.

  Categorical functions
• A person’s unique qualities, values or attitudes.

  Self-expression functions
• Objects or Materials as Process of Self-Extension

  1.      Ways of incorporating Possessions into the Extended Self

  2.      Contamination

  3.      Maintaining Multiple Levels of Self
• People may construct their social identities through the consumption of commercial brands or luxury commodities

  CONSUMERISM
• Purchase can be the consumer's self-concept or self-identity

  (a) bodies; (b) values and character; (c) success and competence, (d) social roles, (e) traits, and, (f) possessions
• "...a  cultural  system  of  commonly  shared  beliefs  and  rituals  that provide a sense of ultimate meaning by creating an idea of reality that is sacred, all-encompassing and supernatural."

  Anthony Giddens (2006), English sociologist
• "...a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, things set-apart and forbidden beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them."

  Émile Durkheim (1912), French Sociologist
• Key Elements of Religion [Giddens (2006)]

  a form of culture, involves rituals, provides purpose
• It shares all characteristics of culture, such as shared beliefs or values that create an identity

  A form of culture
• All members engage in behaviors that identify them as members of the community

  Involves rituals
• It provides a sense of purpose, or the feeling of that life is meaningful

  Provides purpose
• Pre-Colonial Filipino Beliefs

  Animism, Immorality of the soul, larawan/likha, polytheism
• They believed that all objects, both living and non-living, had spirits.

  Animism
• They praised the spirit of ancestors and kept the remains of the dead.

  Immortality of the Soul
• Memories of the dead were retained by carving their image in gold and stone.

  Larawan/Likha
• They believed in many gods, influenced by Chinese and Indian merchants.

  Polytheism
• Filipino Beliefs After Spanish Colonization

  Changes were not immediate, Spaniards introduced monotheism, Animism remained in some tribes, Superstitious beliefs remain in the present
• Early   Filipinos   were   not   instantly   converted   to Christianity because they already had their own set of beliefs practiced in the country.

  Changes were not immediate