Multimedia and Discussion Questions

Chapter 4: Building Order: Culture and History

• Video Links
  • The American ‘Ethnic’ Food Section
    An American visits a grocery store in Berlin and explores the “ethnic” foods aisle and its selection of American foods—macaroni and cheese, blueberry muffin mix, barbecue sauce, and so on.

Discussion Questions:
1. Do you think of macaroni and cheese, barbecue sauce and the other products shown in the video as being “ethnic” foods? Why or why not?

2. Why would a grocer in Berlin stock these things?

3. How is food a part of a society or group’s “personality”? What do these foods in particular say about U.S. culture?

• Andrew Eats Maggot Cheese
  Excerpt from the Travel Channel’s “Bizarre Foods.” Featured in the segment: cheese that contains maggots (a regional delicacy in Sardinia) and the slaughter of an animal.

Discussion Questions:
1. Does this show seem to reflect a relativist or ethnocentric view? Explain your answer.

2. Why do you think that the host looked apologetic when he said that he liked the cheese and when he said that he “likes liver”?

• Wife’s Wish: Bury Me in the Front Yard
  A man runs into legal difficulties when he tries to fulfill his late wife’s wish to be buried at home, on their property.

Discussion Questions:
1. What burial norms are being violated?

2. Several reasons for burying a body in a cemetery are mentioned. What are these? Do they sound “reasonable”? Explain your answer.

3. Would all cultures object to a family member being buried at his or her home?

• From Jesus to Christ – The First Christians
  This program considers the beginnings of Christianity. Over the course of four hours, scholars discuss recent archaeological findings that provide clues about the life of Jesus and his early followers.

2. How does an “academic” or “scholarly” approach to the study of a religion differ from “common” or “everyday” approaches to understanding a religion?

• Gospel of Intolerance
  Many evangelical Christians believe that the culture war against sexual “immorality” has been lost in the US and so they have decided to focus their efforts on African nations. This New York Times video looks at the influence of the evangelical Christian movement in African nations, such as Uganda.

Discussion Questions:
1. What role does money play in these efforts?

2. Why have evangelical Christians focused their attentions on the continent of Africa?

3. How does a religion “change” when it is exported from one culture to another? Is the religion also changed in the process?

• Audio Links
  • No Secular Music for Funerals, says Australian Catholic Church
    The Catholic Church in southern Australia has banned the playing of romantic ballads, pop and heavy metal music, and football anthems at funerals. The church wants the music at funerals to be sacred “rather than a secular expression of the individual’s life.”

Discussion Questions:
1. In what way is the church seeking to conserve the norms surrounding funerals?

2. What is the Catholic church’s concern?

3. How does this reflect changes in Western culture?

• Muslim Holiday Eid Keeps Texas Butcher Busy
  Brief description of Eid (Muslim holiday). Interview with a butcher in a small Texas town who provides halal (acceptable to those who follow Islamic dietary law) meats for grocers who serve the North Texas Muslim community.

2. What makes a meat halal?

3. Changes in the ethnic and religious composition of the U.S. shape both the material and nonmaterial culture of the U.S. as a whole. What were some of the changes identified in this piece?

• Inside Access: Photographer Captures the Taboo
  Interview with a photographer who captures sub- and counterculture groups on the margins. He discusses his techniques for gaining entry to these often secretive groups and how he gains the trust of members. He mentions that it is often difficult to determine which events are staged and which are real. Very similar to what field researchers confront when studying groups that do not welcome outsiders.

Discussion Questions:
1. Is Karen doing a type of visual sociology? Explain your answer.

2. What are the difficulties we—whether professional sociologists or individuals in other vocations who are studying social phenomena—face when studying highly secretive groups?

3. Why would some groups not welcome outsiders? How can this pose a challenge for sociological research?

• 337: Man vs. History
  This program presents stories about people taking history into their own hands. In the first act, a man with no practical experience hatches a plan to curb the violence in Iraq. He thought he could get the Sunni resistance to sit down with Coalition forces to negotiate a cease-fire. So he hooked up with a member of the Iraqi parliament and headed to Baghdad and Amman, where, remarkably, doors opened to him.

Discussion Questions:
1. Do the activities of the man in the first act conform to or violate cultural norms? If so, how?

2. What role does cultural variation play in these stories?

3. Identify the cultural forces that are providing stability in these stories?

• 380: No Map
  Norms are defined as culturally expected rules of conduct. Norms may be ambiguous or contradictory. This episode reveals stories of people who find themselves in situations far from the beaten path, where there are no guidelines and no useful precedents.

Discussion Questions:
1. What do the three parts of this episode tell us about norms in society?

2. How do the people in these stories react when faced with a situation that seems to be normless? Why do you believe they act in the manner they do?

3. A sanction is a direct social response to some behavior. What sanction(s) are demonstrated in each of the stories?

• Web Resources
  Professional Resources

• Sociology of Culture
  The American Sociological Association Section on the Sociology of Culture exists to encourage development of this perspective through the organized interchange of ideas and research. The Section on Culture considers material products, ideas, and symbolic means and their relation to social behavior [self-characterization].
  

Data Resources
There are a number of major surveys and survey organizations that regularly collect data on individual’s knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, and practices. Among the better known of these are:

• GSS
  The General Social Survey (GSS): The GSS is a regular, ongoing omnibus personal interview survey of U.S. households conducted by the National Opinion Research Center. . . . The first survey took place in 1972, and since then more than 40,000 respondents have answered more than 3,500 different questions. From Americans’ racial attitudes to the number of guns owned by women to musical preferences over a lifetime, the General Social Survey measures the trends in American attitudes, experiences, practices, and concerns [self-characterization].
  

• The Gallup Organization
  Gallup Polls: The Gallup Organization is one of the world’s largest management consulting firms. Gallup’s core expertise is in measuring and understanding human attitudes and behavior. . . . Gallup . . . conducts The Gallup Poll, the world’s leading source of public opinion since 1935 [self-characterization].

• Roper Polls
  Roper Polls: Founded in 1947, the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research is the leading educational facility in the field of public opinion. The center exists to promote the intelligent, responsible, and imaginative use of public opinion in addressing the problems faced by Americans and citizens of other nations [self-characterization].

• Pew Global Attitudes Project
  The Pew Global Attitudes Project is a series of worldwide public opinion surveys that encompasses a broad array of subjects ranging from people's assessments of their own lives to their views about the current state of the world and important issues of the day. More than 200,000 interviews in 57 countries have been conducted as part of the project's work [self-characterization].

Other Resources

• The Evolutionary Theories in Social Sciences
  The field of biology presents a very different explanation to the development of humans than sociology. Over the years, a specialized area of sociology, called Sociobiology, has developed to attempt to bridge the gap between the nature (i.e., biology) versus nurture (i.e., sociology/culture) controversy. The Evolutionary Theories in Social Sciences website serves as the premier information site for scholars interested in evolutionary thought in the social sciences [self-characterization].

• ELNA
  Is a cross-culturally universal language possible? Supporters of Esperanto believe so. According to the Esperanto League for North America (ELNA), a nonprofit organization of Esperantists and supporters of Esperanto in the United States, “Esperanto is a language introduced in 1887 by Dr. L.L. Zamenhof after years of development. He proposed Esperanto as a second language that would allow people who speak different native languages to communicate, yet at the same time retain their own languages and cultural identities. Esperanto is four times easier to learn than other languages.”

• Horace Miner’s Analysis
  Stimulate cross-cultural study and understanding through Horace Miner’s classic 1956 analysis, “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema.”

• Smithsonian
  A great way to consider how people understand their own culture is to look at how museums represent cultural artifacts and history. The Smithsonian Institution is called "America's Attic" because it houses a little bit of almost everything from American history and culture. At this site, you can browse or search through selected images from the Collections of the Office of Imaging and Photographic Services. Included are images from current exhibits, Smithsonian events and historic collections.