Values

1. Values • Values: collective ideas about what’s right or wrong; good or bad; desirable or undesirable by a particular culture

2. Robin Williams Core American Values • Individualism = overarching value • Value Clusters Achievement and success Activity and work Efficiency and practicalityScience and progress Material comfort [Education 1975]

3. Robin Williams Core American Values • Value Cluster Equality and Equal Opportunity Democracy Freedom and liberty (free enterprise) Humanitarianism and morality [religiosity; romantic love 1975]

4. Robin Williams Core American Values • Contradictory Values Racism and group superiority (logical outcome of individualism) EQUITY strains -- change

5. American Values • Emerging Values Leisure Self-fulfillment Physical fitness Youthfulness Environmental concerns

6. Culture Strain • Ideal -------real culture • Culture Strains • Cheating-- ex • Moral Holidays/Moral Holiday places • Culture Wars

8. Symbols and Language Essential to Culture

9. Symbols • anything which meaningfully represents something else • Creates shared meanings; powerful feelings  

10. Alphabets • ABCDEFGHIHKLOMNPQUSTUVWXYZ

19. Language • set of symbols that expresses ideas and allows people to communicate Creates visual images • SG: allows shared past, present and future • Complex goal directed planning • Cumulative human experience – can go beyond the immediate • Shared and new perspectives

20. Sapir-Whorf Thesis • language predisposes its People to think and perceive in certain ways, to shape reality by what we notice and how we designate:

21. Verbal – Oral and Written • Symbolsgrammar A,B,C structure/form • Argot – specialized language insider status –”glues and excludes”

22. Non-Verbal • Powerful • Intentional or unintentional • Visual cues • Verbal cues -tone, inflection • Environment and context

23. Types of Non Verbal Communication • Symbolic Action powerful gestures EX. Black power salute 1968 draft card burning lynching bra burning at Miss America

27. Types of Non Verbal Communication • Body Language 1. Facial Expressions – universal Ekman BUT what triggers the emotion acceptable responses = cultural 2. gestures – relative, must be learned staring, eye contact 3. demeanor – tied to relative social power 4. dress

33. Key ideas - Hall • Body language/non verbal language is LEARNED – by observation & imitation • We learn what’s appropriate for gender, ethnicity, class, regions, race

34. “Non verbal communications signalto other members of your own group what kind of person you are, how you feel about others, how you’ll fit in and work in a group, whether you’re anxious, the degree to which you feel comfortable with the standards of your own culture as well as deeply significant feelings about the self…”

35. Non Verbal Communication -space • Space and proximity • personal space distance needed for safety • we react to invasion • Intimate distance – w/in 18 “ – spouses, lovers, close friends • “get out of my face! • Personal distance – immediate area that one claims as private 18”-4’ • Social distance – 4’-12’ formal relationships • Public distance – over 12’

37. Contradictory Messages - paradox • Can’t decipher meaning – get two meanings or cues • Must interpret cues to determine behavior or response • Not the same a lack of clarity or misunderstanding • Ex. flirting