multiple roles, which are performed simultaneously. The process of learning the norms, attitudes, values or behavioural patterns of these groups begins early in life and continues throughout one’s life. The norms and values may differ within a society in different families belonging to different castes, regions or social classes or religious groups according to whether one lives in a village or a city or one belongs to a tribe and if to a tribe, to which tribe. Indeed the very language that one speaks depends on the region one comes from.
Whether the language is closer to a spoken dialect or to a standardised written form depends on the family and the socio-economic and cultural profile of the family. Agencies of Socialisation The child is socialised by several agencies and institutions in which s/he participates, viz. family, school, peer group, neighbourhood, occupational group and by social class/caste, region, religion. Family Since family systems vary widely, the infants’ experiences are by no means standard across cultures.
While many of you may be living in what is termed a nuclear family with your parents and siblings, others may be living with extended family members. In the first case, parents may be key socialising agents but in the others grandparents, an uncle or a cousin may be more significant. Families have varying ‘locations’ within the overall institutions of a society. In most traditional societies, the family into which a person is born largely determines the individual’s social position for the rest of his/her life.
Even when social position is not inherited at birth in this way the region and social class of the family into which an individual is born affect patterns of socialisation quite sharply. Children pick up ways of behaviour characteristic of their parents or others in their neighbourhood or community. Of course, few children simply take over in an unquestioning way the outlook of their parents. This Activity Suggest ways in which the child of a domestic worker would feel herself different from the child whose family her mother works for.
Also, what are the things they might