“It is a highly valued function of society to prevent changes in the rules of the many games it embraces... Deviancy, however, is the very essence of culture.
Saved by Alex Dobrenko and
Culture, writes anthropologist Marshall Sahlins, consists of “meaningful orders of persons and things.” Conventions explain not only why certain persons do certain things, but the origin of collective meanings and orders. To follow the same arbitrary rules as another individual is to be part of the same “collectivity.” As groups share certain pract
... See moreWhatever else a culture is, it is a repertoire of desirable forms of change.
Society can be destroyed when further growth of mass production renders the milieu hostile, when it extinguishes the free use of the natural abilities of society’s members, when it isolates people from each other and locks them into a man-made shell, when it undermines the texture of community by promoting extreme social polarization and splinterin
... See moreEverything we point to as “culture”—customs, traditions, fashions, and fads—exists as conventions.
We need culture to take on the task because we cannot do it all by ourselves. In order to know ourselves well, we rely on the level of self-awareness, courage and honesty circulating in society as a whole. We will be as hypocritical as the most representative voices around us and we will, conversely, be freed by what society is prepared to countena
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