Lecture 9, Understanding Cultural Change

At the beginning of the term I told you that, because social change was such a complex topic, we would look at only two facets of it – institutional change and cultural change. We covered institutional change during the first half of the course and cultural change during the second half. The final paper is designed to allow you to demonstrate what you have learned about the analysis of cultural change from a sociological perspective, although you certainly may write about institutional change as well. This lecture will provide a summary of some of the concepts and ideas you might use in your Final Paper. I’ve organized my thoughts around some questions I’d like you keep in mind as you write.

What is Culture?

The first thing you will want to do in your paper is to provide some examples that illustrate the concept of culture. I’ve defined culture as “the products of human activities”. These products can be both material (things) and non-material (thoughts). They include such things as symbols, values, technologies, art, language, norms, and fashion. One of the thing you’ll want to do in your paper you will be to describe the changes you can see in the material products of human activities and the changes in the non-material culture you can infer from the characters actions or words. This description will form the basis for the more important analytical parts of your paper.

How do changes in culture affect individuals?

The sociological imagination tells us that people are products of the time and place in which they live. Because there are changes in culture over time, and people are the products of culture, people in different eras are different. We reflect our cultures. Whether we conform or rebel we are still products of the time and place in which we live. That doesn’t mean we are all alike or that we are equally comfortable with the dominant culture. There are many subcultures within the United States and it is also important to keep in mind the difference between “real” culture and “ideal” culture. Ideal culture includes the norms that tell us what we should do. Real culture is about behavior. What people actually do. Our ideal culture holds up the virtue of marriage. Man, woman, till death do us part. The reality is that most people get divorced at least once and many relationships are between people of the same gender. The current debate over gay marriages is about cultural change. Many interesting films are about the differences between ideal culture and real culture. Perhaps your pair can be described this way to show how culture affects individuals. Since you will (unless you are using Colonial House) be looking at the same character(s) in two different cultural settings, you should be able to describe how the cultural changes described above affect the people in the story. Those of you who are using Colonial House will want to make use of some of the tools on the website to think about how the typical person in colonial times might be different from a typical person today and why.

Is the medium the message? What’s different about the movies themselves? (Or what does the production of Colonial House tell you about the our culture?)

Movies are a product of human activity. They are a part of culture in two ways. First as human product the actual movie itself is part of culture. Humans are affected by their cultures. Since the two movies were produced by different people at different points in time, we would expect different cultural elements to be reflected in the making of the films. Some of the things you might consider are pace, story, perspective, and purpose. Any differences that reflect the technologies available to movie makers? Second films reflect and to some extent create culture. Many people had never heard of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy until it became a major movie series. Now everyone knows what a hobbit is and orcs are universal symbol of evil. Hobbits and orcs are a much bigger part of culture than they used to be thanks to the blockbuster movies. Remember that many films are shown in other countries ofter to larger audiences than in the US. Globalization? Grobalization? Americanization? What contributions do your films make to culture, our own or others around the world? How do they reflect the current culture? Can you see evidence of rationalization or the idealism/materialism debate in them?

What causes cultural change? What factors in society might have produced the differences you see in the two movies?

In Harper & Leicht you read about some of the social processes that cause cultural change either by changing the technologies available to us, creating new moral issues (cloning, surrogate parenting), or presenting alternatives to existing norms, values, and beliefs. Some of those social processes are invention, discovery, and diffusion. Changes in material factors in society (demographic, i.e. higher percentage of people under 20 or environmental, i.e. global warming) cause cultural change as does human agency. Rating systems for movies may have altered the content of a remake. Or more relaxed standards in society about language might allow more realistic colloquialisms.

You are certainly not limited to the concepts and ideas I’ve outlined above but I hope they will provide a starting point for your analysis. I hope to see lots of evidence that you understand culture and cultural change from a sociological perspective.