Sociology Cultural and Social Concepts Flashcards

Vocabulary flashcards covering key sociological definitions, cultural terms, and social statuses from the lecture notes.

Achieved Status

a social position a person takes on voluntarily that reflects personal ability and effort

Ascribed Status

Social position a person receives at birth or involuntarily later in life

Counter-Culture

group that rejects the values, norms, and practices of the larger society and replaces them with a new set of culture patterns

Cultural Lag

William Ogburn's term for a gap between the technical development of a society (material culture) and its moral and legal institutions (nonmaterial culture)

Cultural Leveling

the process by which cultures become similar to one another; refers especially to the process by which U.S. culture is being exported and diffused into other nations.

Cultural Relativism

Taking into account the differences across cultures without passing judgment or assigning value

Cultural Shock

emotional stress that frequently occurs when people encounter an extremely different culture

Cultural Universal

a value, norm, or other cultural trait that is found in every group

Ethnic Group

people of the same race or nationality who share a distinctive culture

Ethnocentrism

the practice of judging another culture by the standards of one's own culture

Folkway

norms that lack moral significance

Ideal Culture

practices, beliefs, and values that are regarded as most desirable and are consciously taught to children

Material Culture

the material objects that distinguish a group of people, such as their art, buildings, weapons, utensils, machines, hairstyles, clothing, and jewelry

McDonaldization

Term used by sociologist George Ritzer in his book The McDonaldization of Society (1995). He describes it as the process by which a society takes on the characteristics of a fast-food restaurant (efficiency, calculability, predictability, &control).

More

Norms that are strictly enforced; essential core values of the group

Negative Sanction

an expression of disapproval for breaking a norm

Norm

an understood rule for accepted and expected behavior

Pluralistic Society

A society in which two or more ethnic groups or nationalities are politically organized into one territorial state but maintain their cultural differences.

Popular Culture

Cultural traits such as dress, diet and music that identify and are part of today's changeable, urban-based, media-influenced western societies

Positive Sanction

a reward or positive reaction for following norms, ranging from a smile to a prize

Racial Group

People who identify with one another on the basis of their ancestry and cultural heritage

Subculture

the values and related behaviors of a group that distinguish its members from the larger culture; a world within a world

Symbolic Culture

another term for nonmaterial culture

Taboo

Excluded or forbidden from use or mention

Value

The standards by which people define what is good or bad, beautiful or ugly, wanted or not

Value Cluster

a series of interrelated values that together form a larger whole.

Value Contradictions

Values that contradict one another; to follow the one means to come into conflict with the other.

Vested Interest

Veblen's term for those people or groups who will suffer in the event of social change, and who have a stake in maintaining the status quo.