Socialization An excerpt from “Is Everyone Really Equal?”

Ozlem Sensoy and Robin DiAngelo

Overview and Main Ideas of “Socialization”

The power of socialization is an unconscious process that works to shape our understanding of the world.

“Socialization refers to our systematic training into the norms of our culture. The process of learning the meanings and practices that allow us to behave in an acceptable way”(Sensoy & DiAngelo, 15).

Surface culture and deep culture

Surface Culture- identify superficial aspects of our culture (Food, Dress Music, etc.)

Deep Culture- identify unspoken rules and unconscious rules that we live by on a daily basis.

Social Norms and Conformity

Gender Norms- we are socialized to expect certain behaviors from people that look female or male.

Racial norms connected to stereotypes- “… resumes with White sounding names received 50% more callbacks than the resumes with stereotypically Black-sounding names”

Conformity- “Socialization is so effective that we often times actually have a physical reaction when the norm is violated” .. “there are penalties for not conforming”..(Sensoy and DiAngelo, 19).

Frames and Lenses

Frame- is the “big picture” which are norms we are all taught from birth about societal norms. Received from school, government and mass media.

Example: “Pink represents girl and blue represents boy” Lenses- (Micro) Norms is our own personal

perspective. Developed by our unique life experiences. This is what makes us one of a kind.

Example: “My parents taught me to that it is wrong to burp in public, people who burp in public are rude”.

Our frames and lenses are impacted by our specific group identity

What does that mean?

“The social groups we are born or develop into are part of the frames of our glasses. For example, when we are born we are socialized according to whether we are male or female, rich or poor, able-bodied or with a disability”(Sensoy and DiAneglo, 23).

Based on these characteristics there are already aspects of you that people believe about you before even meeting you.