2 | The Process of Socialisation
Chapter 2 builds on the “culture material” in the first chapter by exploring how culture is created in one of two ways: 1. Through the influence of instincts, a largely non-sociological (‘nature’) approach to understanding culture. 2. Through the influence of our social environment, a conventional sociological approach that outlines different types and agencies of […]
1 | The Formation of Culture
Around 5 years ago I published a book for the OCR Specification (don’t thank me, somebody had to) and although it’s still available if you want to buy it , it’s probably out-lived what little economic utility it once had. I decided, therefore, it’s probably time to make it freely available to anyone who wants […]
The Manifest and Latent Functions of CAGE
While mnemonics are not everyone’s favourite hot beverage I’ve always found them a very useful memory device – and I’m particularly fond of CAGE (Class, Age, Gender, Ethnicity) and its less-exulted compatriots CAGES (…Sexuality) and CAGED (…Disability) for a couple of reasons: Firstly, it has a simple manifest function for students. If you’re ever stuck […]
GCSE AQA Sociology Revision Guides
I recently came across this interesting set of guides for the AQA Spec., written by Lydia Hiraide of The BRIT School. The guides are dated 2013 – and although I’m not sure how they might fit into the latest Specification, I’m guessing there’s going to be a lot here that’s still relevant. You can download […]
Seven Sims in Seven Days – Day 1: The Urinal Game
Background We can illustrate the idea of cultural learning (and show how the concepts of roles, values and norms are inter-related into the bargain) using Proxemic theory – the study of how people understand and use space in a cultural context – originally developed by Hall (1966). Although we are born with the ability to […]
Introducing Sociology: Video as a visual dimension for teaching about norms
If you want to add a visual dimension to your students’ understanding of norms the Can of Worms YouTube Channel has a selection of short films you can use as illustrative material. There are quite a few films from which to choose, so it probably pays to be selective. The focus, as ever, is on […]
Introducing Sociology: Setting Sociological Ground Rules
One way to introduce Sociology to students who have never studied the subject is to focus on the concept of roles because this is a simple way to introduce a range of basic sociological concepts, from values, through norms to socialisation. If you want to give these ideas a “real world” context and meaning an easy […]