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Full-Text Articles in Sociology of Culture

Elucidating Evolutionary Principles With The Traditional Mosuo: Adaptive Benefits And Origins Of Matriliny And “Walking Marriages”, Jose C. Yong, Norman P. Li Dec 2022

Elucidating Evolutionary Principles With The Traditional Mosuo: Adaptive Benefits And Origins Of Matriliny And “Walking Marriages”, Jose C. Yong, Norman P. Li

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The Mosuo, arguably the last surviving matrilineal society in China, offers interesting insights into kinship practices that support reproduction. In particular, the modes of courtship and reproduction of the traditional Mosuo revolve around a practice known as walking marriages, which involves no contract or obligations, where the men do not use social status or resources to court women, women do not expect commitment from men, and multiple sexual relationships are permitted for both sexes and seldom incite conflict. Children borne from walking marriages are cared for not so much by fathers but rather their mothers' brothers, and wealth and property …


Cultural Variability In The Link Between Environmental Concern And Support For Environmental Action, Kimin Eom, Heejung S. Kim, David K. Sherman, Keiko Ishii Oct 2016

Cultural Variability In The Link Between Environmental Concern And Support For Environmental Action, Kimin Eom, Heejung S. Kim, David K. Sherman, Keiko Ishii

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Research on sustainability behaviors has been based on the assumption that increasing personal concerns about the environment will increase proenvironmental action. We tested whether this assumption is more applicable to individualistic cultures than to collectivistic cultures. In Study 1, we compared 47 countries (N = 57,268) and found that they varied considerably in the degree to which environmental concern predicted support for proenvironmental action. National-level individualism explained the between-nation variability above and beyond the effects of other cultural values and independently of person-level individualism. In Study 2, we compared individualistic and collectivistic nations (United States vs. Japan; N = 251) …


Intersubjective Norms: Cultural And Interpersonal Perspective, Kimin Eom, Heejung S. Kim Nov 2015

Intersubjective Norms: Cultural And Interpersonal Perspective, Kimin Eom, Heejung S. Kim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Normative perspectives in cultural psychology provide a fresh view to understand the processes of cultural influence on human behavior. Although much of the existing research focuses on individuals’ internalized personal values and beliefs to explain cultural tendencies, the new perspective proposes perceived intersubjective norms as an alternative key component in cultural influence (Chiu, Gelfand, Yamagishi, Shteynberg, & Wan, 2010; Zou et al., 2009). Extending this newly emerging approach, the lead articles in this special issue address some of the important questions and issues of normative perspectives in cultural psychology. The articles provide useful explanations for why individuals vary in the …


Culture, Psyche, And Body Make Each Other Up, Dov Cohen, Angela K. Y. Leung, Hans Ijzerman Dec 2009

Culture, Psyche, And Body Make Each Other Up, Dov Cohen, Angela K. Y. Leung, Hans Ijzerman

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The commentaries make important points, including ones about the purposeful uses of embodiment effects. Research examining such effects needs to look at how such effects play themselves out in people's everyday lives. Research might usefully integrate work on embodiment with work on attribution and work in other disciplines concerned with body–psyche connections (e.g., research on somaticizing versus “psychologizing” illnesses and hypercognizing versus hypocognizing emotions). Such work may help us understand the way positive and negative feedback loops operate as culture, psyche, and body make each other up.


Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong Jun 1996

Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Popular music as a site of struggles over meaning is focused upon, where the social and political relations between different groups in Singapore society are mirrored. How ruling elites and everyday people make use of the same cultural form--popular music--for different purposes is examined.


Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1996

Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper illustrates how popular music written, produced, and performed by Singaporeans provides a means through which the culture and society of Singapore may be understood. Music with English language text conveys a sense of place and reflects a distinctively Singaporean spirit and identity. The paper examines four themes: the portrayal of Singapore's multiracial population which reflects a unique cultural synthesis; the Singaporeans' concept of urbanity, manifested as the simultaneous attraction and repulsion towards the city and the desire for nature and the rustic; the distinctive social engineering in Singapore; and the way in which global issues are imported into …


Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong Jan 1996

Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Formalist critics and aestheticians have argued that music does not possess any kind of "extra-musical" significance, that there is no meaning beyond the form and structural relations of the notes. For them, music exemplifies the laws of mathematical harmony and proportion rather than the social and political contexts within which it is produced, reproduced and consumed. This view has been challenged by a number of social theorists: Max Weber, Theodor Adorno and Edward Said have all argued for an understanding of music within its social, cultural, economic and political contexts. Such analysis of popular music is now unquestioned. Indeed, it …