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Elements Of Social Construction

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It can be a difficult idea to grasp the idea of social construction. The idea that our reality may not be as simple or concrete as it can initially seem. It is also not an easy task to take what we feel most comfortable with, or what we think is the most natural or best way to live, and dissect it. Asking ourselves why things are the way that they are can be challenging. Sociologists have termed this the social construction of reality. This idea brings into question many elements of our everyday lives – elements that we may not even realized could have been constructed in the first place. One element that is easier to identify as a social construction is the idea of race. Race is constantly brought up in our lives through media, conversations, …show more content…

For individuals these roles start even before birth – expectations and norms that each gender is supposed to display to fit into our idea of what men and women are supposed to be. How we act, what we say and how we say it, what our interests are, how we interact with others, what we value; a lot of this can be defined by our gender. Growing up in a society where little girls are sugar and spice and everything nice and little boys are snips and snails and puppy dogs tails, it is hard to imagine that boys and girls could vary much from those ideas. However, our ideas of men and women are always evolving just as in other cultures the gender norms for men and women differ vastly from ours. Some cultures, such as some Native American tribes, acknowledge three or even four different …show more content…

Some behaviors are only devious when considered in the context of that culture. Devious behavior are those that have a typically negative consequence, either formally or informally. This can be harmless ones, such as picking your nose, to more severe ones, such as assault. However, things once considered devious may no longer be so as our perceptions change over time. Ideas of homosexuality or a person identifying as transgender used to be devious behaviors, whereas now they are more accepted and those individuals are finding their place along our society’s

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