MediaSpace Wiki

Intercultural Spr2006 Sess11

Social Construction and Structuration

Social construction are
- cultural inventions or artifacts
- that exist solely because people agree to behave as if it exists
Obvious Examples:
- Games
- Language
- Money
- Governments
- Organizations
- Relationships
- Roles and titles
- Rules and laws
Less obvious examples
- Class
- Race
- Gender
- Religion
- Culture
Social constructions are artifices that we treat as realities
Erickson's eight stages of development speak to the process by which we construct ourselves into existing social constructions:
- http://www.childdevelopmentinfo.com/development/erickson.shtml
Communicators
- act strategically
  - according to rules
    - to achieve goals
- and thereby create structures
  - that come back to affect future actions.
A circularity that resolves a conflict
- between those who hold that
  - human action is caused by outside forces
  - human action is the intentional product of individual volition
- between creativity and constraint
Giddens says "both" and describes a mechanism
- We act intentionally
- but our actions have the unintended consequence
  - of creating structures that affect future actions
    - rules
    - norms
    - roles
    - expectations
    - organizations
    - languages
    - media'
This "structuration" pervades social life
There are three dimensions of structuration
1. how things should be understood (interpretation or signification)
  - expressed in the modality of communication
2. how we should act (morality or legitimation)
  - expressed in the modality of norms
3. how to get things done (power or domination)
  - expressed in the modality of facilities

-- Last edited August 27, 2008

Unless otherwise noted, the contents of this page were written by participants on the Media Space Wiki, operated by Davis Foulger, and should be cited accordingly. For example (APA):
Foulger, D. and other participants. (August 27, 2008). Intercultural Spr2006 Sess11. MediaSpaceWiki. Retrieved on from http://evolutionarymedia.com/wiki.htm?InterculturalSpr2006Sess11.