Socialisation

The sociological theory is that of culture and socialisation. In basic terms, the idea is that we are born into a society that has certain rules of behaviour (culture) and we, as human beings, learn these rules through a process of Socialisation.

Socialisation :- process where we are socialised into learning norms and values which are essential for the society.

In the following chart you can see the agencies of socialisation; what causes socialisation to an individual.

There are two parts of socialisation. They are Primary socialisation and Secondary socialisation:-

Primary socialisation is where the family teaches the new member of the family of their norms and values and actions appropriate to individuals as members of a particular culture.

Examples :-

-a mother would teach her child to act like a grown up and be responsible, this will lead the child into believeing those are his norms and values.

-a child saw their mother expressing a discriminatory opinion about a minority group, then that child may think this behaviour is acceptable and could continue to have this opinion about minority groups.

Secondary socialisation refers to process of learning what is appropriate behavior as a member of a smaller group within the larger society. It is usually associated with teenagers and adults, and involves smaller changes than those occurring in primary socialization. eg. entering a new profession, relocating to a new environment or society.

The agents of the secondary socialization :

- School where the agency responsible for socializing groups of young people in particular skills and values in society.

- Peers, where people who are roughly the same age and/or who share other social characteristics (e.g. students in a college class).

- Mass media

- Religion & workplace.

Henslin (1999:76) highlighted that "an important part of socialization is the learning of culturally defined gender roles." Boys learn to be boys and girls learn to be girls. This "learning" happens by way of many different agents of socialization.

Secondary socialization takes place later in childhood and into maturity. Schools, peer groups, organizations, the media and eventually the workplace become socializing forces for individuals.