Along with Meghan's thoughts about the culture of the girls soccer team I began to think about the many cultures that we are involved in on a day to day basis. Some of the cultures you never really notice unless you think about it.
The culture of the classroom. In the classroom we have different rituals such as the teacher lectures, the students ask questions, we have class discussions on important issues. We memorize facts, we present projects in front of groups, we take exams, we write papers.
The classroom also has a language we talk both formally and informally depending on the teacher. We talk about important issues in discussion format. This is a culture I never really knew I was apart of until I actually read Meghan's post.
The culture of the cafeteria. In the cafeteria we grab plates, wait in lines, get seconds, listen to the Pandora station the "caf" people pick, we sit with certain people, we sit in chairs at tables. We also have a language when it comes to the cafeteria, we call it the "caf" no matter what the bon appetite people say it is called. This is a culture.
It is interesting to think about the many cultures that evolve inside the American culture. Culture is a way of life of a group of people. The many cultures that we exist in on a day to day basis impact the ways in which we interact with the other cultures that we are involved in. Just think about it!
I had never really thought about all the different cultures either. But my question is when do we differ between a culture and just what we do? or is just what we do the whole essence of a culture? I guess Im a little confused on this because to me, I would not have considered the getting a plate, waiting in line and sitting at a table culture because it is mainly just to prevent chaos and so we can eat comfortably but then I thought about how some cultures sit on the ground to eat or eat with chopsticks rather than silverware. I would not define our culture by such standard routines but when you think about it, these kind of things do have defining elements to them that say even a little about how we live our lives.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting how we participate in regular day to day cultures, but that got me thinking how we create our own cultures by consuming certain types of media. For instance the younger adults and children use Facebook, which most of our grandparents or sometimes even parents don't use. So if we reference something like "poke" usually the older generations would not know what we are talking about, therefore they are not in the culture.
ReplyDeleteBut this can be used in other forms of media that are not so broad. For instance I watch the show Supernatural so I might say something like "Assbutt." Another example is when my sister (who also watches the show) says, "Jerk," and I reply "Bitch." To people who don't watch the show this would look like my sister and I are being mean to each other or that I am a foulmouthed dork for saying, "Assbutt." However, to me and my siblings we know that I am referring to the character Castiel when I say, "Assbutt." And when my sister and I have that little name calling session we are referring to Sam and Dean.
It is interesting how even the media can shape people to certain cultures.