UCSP Grade $$12$$ Study Guide — Disciplines, Society, and Culture

Vocabulary practiced based on UCSP Grade $$12$$ Study Guide covering disciplines of society, types of societies, and the elements and changes of culture.

Anthropology

The scientific study of human beings, their behavior, and the state of being human.

Cultural Anthropology

A branch of anthropology that studies human societies and elements of cultural life, such as Linguistic Anthropology which focuses on language.

Sociology

The study of human social relationships and institutions, focusing on how human action and consciousness shape and are shaped by social structures.

Political Science

The study of government, power, and political processes with the goal of promoting political understanding and improving quality of life.

Functionalist Perspective

A theoretical perspective that views society as functioning like an organism where various parts work together.

Conflict Perspective

A theoretical perspective focusing on power struggles and inequality within society.

Symbolic Interactionism

A theoretical perspective focusing on the patterned social interaction between individuals.

Society

Derived from the Latin term societas (from socius), meaning companion or associate; defined as a group of people with common territory, interaction, and culture.

Gregariousness

The natural desire to be with others, which is one of the reasons society exists.

Pre-Class Societies

Societies characterized by communal ownership of property and division of labor.

Asiatic Societies

Economically self-sufficient societies where leaders are despotic and powerful.

Ancient Societies

Societies defined by private land ownership where the rich owned large tracts of property while the poor worked as laborers.

Feudal Societies

Societies where aristocrats owned the wealth and peasants worked on the lords' land with few benefits.

Capitalist Societies

Societies where two classes emerged: the Bourgeoisie, who own the capital, and the Proletariat, who are the workers.

Democratic Societies

Societies where citizens enjoy freedoms such as speech, choice of occupation, and participation in government.

Simple Societies

Small communities characterized by very little specialization.

Compound Societies

Societies formed as population grew and several groups joined together.

Doubly Compound Societies

Advanced and highly organized societies in the evolutionary view.

Food-Gathering Societies

The oldest societies in human history.

Horticultural Societies

Societies where people learned to cultivate plants.

Pastoral Societies

Societies characterized by the domestication of animals.

Agricultural Societies

Societies that use advanced farming methods and tools.

Industrial Societies

Societies that emerged during the Industrial Revolution.

Post-Industrial / Information Society

The type of society in which we currently live.

Culture (E. B. Tylor definition)

A complex whole which consists of knowledge, beliefs, ideas, habits, attitudes, and skills working as a whole, as defined in $1871$.

Enculturation

The process of learning or transmitting culture through socialization, or the deliberate infusion of a new culture into another.

Symbols

Anything used to stand for something else within a culture.

Language

Known as the storehouse of culture; used to communicate with others.

Technology

The application of knowledge and equipment to ease the task of living and maintaining the environment.

Values

Defined standards for what is good or desirable; they predict how individuals will probably respond in given circumstances.

Beliefs

The faith of an individual within a culture.

Norms

Specific rules or standards that guide appropriate behavior.

Prescriptive Norm

A type of norm that tells us things TO do.

Proscriptive Norm

A type of norm that tells us things NOT to do.

Folkways

Customs or customary/repetitive ways of doing things; these are norms for everyday behavior.

Mores

Norms that control moral and ethical behavior based on definitions of right and wrong.

Laws

Controlled ethics that are morally agreed upon, written down, and enforced by an official law enforcement agency.

Material Culture

Tangible things, physical objects, resources, and spaces people use to define their culture.

Non-Material Culture

Intangible things, including non-physical ideas like beliefs, values, rules, norms, and morals.

Parallelism

A mode of cultural change where the same culture develops in two or more different places independently.

Diffusion

Behavioral patterns that pass back and forth from one culture to another; also the spread of cultural traits or social practices.

Convergence

When two or more cultures are fused or merged into one, making it different from the originals.

Fission

Occurs when people break away from their original culture and develop a different culture of their own.

Acculturation

The process wherein individuals incorporate behavioral patterns of other cultures into their own, either voluntarily or by force; also known as cultural borrowing.

Assimilation

When the culture of a larger society is adopted by a smaller society, which then assumes the culture of the host society; often involves blending or fusion.

Accommodation

When larger and smaller societies respect and tolerate each other's culture even after prolonged contact.

Discovery

The process of finding a new place, object, artifact, or anything that previously existed but was unknown.

Invention

A creative mental process of devising, creating, and producing something new or novel, categorized as social or material.

Amalgamation

The biological or hereditary fusion of members of different societies.

Colonization

The political and social policy of establishing a colony subject to the rule or governance of the colonizing state.