Symbols In The Socialization Process

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Symbols play a significant role in our socialization process; from understanding the role of our moms and dads to the difference between ice cream and toilet paper. Our social interaction relies heavily on the understandings of these symbols. When we misinterpret or are misinformed about the meaning of these symbols a breakdown may occur. With such a break down the consequences and be devastating. There is a multitude of reasons Symbols become misinterpreted, we shall look at three of these, Perspective, Education, Social Status; All based on a conversation I had with an elderly female of European decent about racial issues while growing up in the United States Let start our conversation just as ours began, with social status. She relayed …show more content…

Then the anger of the Lord would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly. (GOD) If you take these two verses at face value a person can see where the misunderstandings may lie. However, if you go back and read from the beginning of the chapter you can see this was a conversation about non-believers between God and the Jewish peoples while conquering middle eastern lands. Deuteronomy 7 …show more content…

If a person is taught they are bad based on the color of their skin that plays a significant role in how they see themselves. This is also true if you were never told that the color of your skin was an issue. When we got closer in our conversation to the 1960’s a time in which the civil rights movement was at full speed, her accounts seemed trivial at best. At first I thought maybe dementia may of the cause for this lack of recollection, however I know truly feel that this is the way it was in her eyes. She claimed to stay away from newspapers and they were too poor to own a TV or radio. When the civil right movement was at full steam and segregation was overturned, for her it was like a new family moved into the neighborhood. She said she began seeing them working at the mill, but for the most part nothing had changed. She held on to her claims that there was no difference to her. She more or less just saw “colored people” as she referred to them as new members of society she had never seen before. I think in her mind, there really wasn’t a difference; it all about what you believe, I

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