cultural theory

Examples of cultural theory in the following topics:

• Sources of Social Change

  • Some of the better-known approaches include deprivation theory, mass-society theory, structural-strain theory, resource-mobilization theory, political process theory and culture theory.
  • This particular section will thus pay attention to structural-strain theory and culture theory, while mass-society theory and political process theory will be discussed in greater detail later in "International Sources of Social Change" and "External Sources of Social Change," respectively.
  • First, it emphasizes the importance of movement culture.
  • In emphasizing the injustice frame, culture theory also addresses the free-rider problem.
  • Analyze the similarities and differences in the various social movement theories - deprivation, mass-society, structural-strain, resource-mobilization, political process and culture

• Cultural Intelligence

  • Studying the components of culture, the theories pertaining to cultural dimensions and competencies, and the current initiatives in promoting these concepts are all powerful resources for managers involved in foreign assignments.
  • As a result, individuals interested in developing their cultural quotient (CQ) are tasked with studying each of these facets of cultural intelligence in order to accurately recognize the beliefs, values, and behaviors of the culture in which they are immersed.
  • Hofstede's theory of cultural dimensions is particularly interesting, as it allows for a direct quantification of specific cultural values in order to measure and benchmark cultural norms in a relative and meaningful way.
  • Hofstede's theory was designed in the 1960s and 1970s, and has remained a relevant perspective in international business, international politics, and cross-cultural psychology.
  • His theory notes six specific variables to measure:

• Types of Organizational Culture

  • While there is no single "type" of organizational culture, and cultures can vary widely from one organization to the next, commonalities do exist, and some researchers have developed models to describe different indicators of organizational cultures.
  • While there are several types of cultural and organizational theory models, Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory is one of the most cited and referenced.
  • Artifacts: The simplest perspective on culture is provided by the tangible artifacts that reveal specific cultural predispositions.
  • Person culture: In this type of culture, horizontal structures are most applicable.
  • Differentiate between varying organizational culture tendencies, specifically within the context of Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory

• Cultural Psychology

  • The main tenet of cultural psychology is that mind and culture are inseparable and mutually constitutive, meaning that people are shaped by their culture and their culture is also shaped by them.
  • A major goal of cultural psychology is to expand the number and variation of cultures that contribute to basic psychological theories, so that these theories become more relevant to the predictions, descriptions, and explanations of all human behaviors—not just Western ones.
  • Cultural psychology is often confused with cross-cultural psychology; however, it is distinct in that cross-cultural psychologists generally use culture as a means of testing the universality of psychological processes, rather than determining how local cultural practices shape psychological processes.
  • Cultural-historical psychology is a psychological theory formed by Lev Vygotsky in the late 1920s and further developed by his students and followers in Eastern Europe and worldwide.
  • This theory focuses on how aspects of culture, such as values, beliefs, customs, and skills, are transmitted from one generation to the next.

• Cultural Lag

  • Cultural lag can occur when technological innovation outpaces cultural adaptation.
  • Cultural lag is not only a concept, as it also relates to a theory and explanation in sociology.
  • His theory of cultural lag suggests that a period of maladjustment occurs when the non-material culture is struggling to adapt to new material conditions.
  • But these changes in the non-material culture do not match exactly with the change in the material culture.
  • This delay is the cultural lag.

• High and Low Culture

  • Popular culture studies is the academic discipline studying popular culture from a critical theory perspective.
  • High culture most commonly refers to the set of cultural products, mainly in the arts, held in the highest esteem by a culture.
  • High culture became an important concept in political theory on nationalism for writers such as Ernest Renan and Ernest Gellner , who saw it as a necessary component of a healthy national identity.
  • Gellner's concept of a high culture extended beyond the arts; he used it to distinguish between different cultures (rather than within a culture), contrasting high cultures with simpler, agrarian low cultures.
  • Discuss the roles of both high culture and popular culture within society

• Theoretical Perspectives in Sociology

  • Sociological theory is developed at multiple levels, ranging from grand theory to highly contextualized and specific micro-range theories.
  • Putnam's theory proposes:
  • This element of Putnam's theory clearly illustrates the basic purpose of sociological theory.
  • In short, Putnam's theory clearly encapsulates the key ideas of a sociological theory.
  • The theoretical perspectives in sociology use both micro- and macro-perspectives to understand sociological and cultural phenomenon.

• What is Social Constructivism?

  • Social constructivism emphasizes the importance of culture and context in understanding what occurs in society and constructing knowledge based on this understanding (Derry, 1999; McMahon, 1997).
  • This perspective is closely associated with many contemporary theories, most notably the developmental theories of Vygotsky and Bruner, and Bandura's social cognitive theory (Shunk, 2000).

• Strain Theory: How Social Values Produce Deviance

  • Strain theory states that social structures within society may pressure citizens to commit crimes.
  • For instance, individuals in the U.S. who sell illegal drugs have rejected the culturally acceptable means of making money, but still share the widely accepted cultural value in the U.S. of making money.
  • Social strain theory was developed by famed American sociologist Robert K.
  • The theory states that social structures may pressure citizens to commit crimes .
  • In this sense, according social strain theory, social values actually produce deviance in two ways.

• Animals and Culture

  • Animal culture refers to cultural learning in non-human animals through socially transmitted behaviors.
  • Animal culture refers to cultural learning in non-human animals through socially transmitted behaviors.
  • The question of the existence of culture in non-human societies has been a contentious subject for decades due to the inexistence of a concise definition for culture.
  • One of the first signs of culture in early humans was the use of tools.
  • Charles Darwin first attempted to find the existence of imitation in animals when trying to prove his theory that the human mind had evolved from that of lower beings.