Culture and Socialization

Abstract

This chapter shows how other sciences have put material substance on two of sociology’s most ideational concepts: culture and socialization. The model of culture that has long dominated the social sciences is a purely ideational one decoupled from biology. There are two major views of culture: transmitted and evoked. Viewed in light of N. Tinbergen’s some questions, transmitted and evoked notions of culture are intertwined and compatible. Transmitted culture is the ideational view with which all social scientists are familiar. Culture serves as a conduit for the selection of genetic variants, and these variants then motivate their carriers to select cultural practices congenial to them over other cultural practices. Socialization is the process of acquiring transmitted culture, and has been defined as the process of internalizing “rules, roles, attitudes, standards, and values across the social, emotional, cognitive, and personal domains”. Mainstream sociology’s view of socialization is simply the transfer of ideas from brain to brain.

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