Thursday, March 3, 2011

you're weird...

Our value and norms in our society are unlike those in any other society.  Americans value money and individualism more than anything.  There is a wide variety of norms and values in our culture and society, mainly because of the huge diversity of the people that live here.  The things we value and normal day to day activities that we don’t even think twice about may be totally frowned about elsewhere.  Asking someone “How are you?” in Europe would lead to a ten minute conversation about how their day actually was, whereas in America, it is just a common thing that people don’t actually mean.  Also, it is considered extremely rude in other countries to end a conversation because you have to be somewhere on time, because there really is no sense of time there. 
                In class, we discussed the different values of our culture that are looked down upon.  Folkways, misdemeanors, taboos and felonies are all different levels of breaking the social norm.  Things like interracial dating and marriage, insulting a dead person, and using certain language in public are all things that most people in this society do not agree with.  The ways people interact with each other in this society and how they view others is all based on their opinions and if the people follow the social norms and values or not.  If a person dresses or acts not according to the norms, people tend to stay away from them and try not to associate themselves with them so they don’t look like they’re not following the norms either.

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