Cultural Assesment

I selected my boots, for the fact that I’m a Texan, born and raised, and no matter where I go, the boots come with me. They represent gentlemanliness, the willingness to stand up for the little guy or a lady, the ability to fix pretty much anything, and the fact that once you’re done working, you’re ready to dance and drink – all things that were ingrained with me through my socialization as a Texan. As they are also Luchesse’s, they represent my socioeconomic status, and their size, 13D, shows that I am a large man, but still nimble ;) 

     

My wallet was also picked to represent my SES, because the top 1% of the world’s wealth in walking around campus with us, but also to show my status as a socialized American, with my Driver’s License up to date and my University ID – going to school because the modern world says I need letters after my name to be taken seriously. The look of the wallet is also representative of the style that I have been socialized with, picking things out of the world to inspire my style.      

The ring box was chosen as a symbol of my roots – coming from my grandparents, Brazilian, Italian, and still very American and being handed down through the institution of marriage, as I have been socialized to see it, in a Christian home, and it held the engagement ring for the woman I marry next week, which is another symbol that our society says that I need to give her to express my intent to marry her and my love for her. The fact that it was a hand me down ring though, still shows my SES is not upper class, and that I have been socialized to budget and manage my money well, through watching the faults and successes of those around me.      

I chose my Bible because it is the one thing that has competed with my socialization to the norms of the world, while socializing me in many other ways. It shows my religion and the version, NIV Study Bible, shows my socialization as a nerd, to still seek knowledge and history at all times, even in my worship and pursuit of righteousness. To me, it doesn't just represent the figure of my worship and my hope and strength, and the reason that I'm bent toward loving others the way I do, but it represents my past, and growing up in the church, and being socialized by the church, in as many ways as people outside of the church try to socialize you. Ultimately, my Bible reminds me that I'm free from conforming to the socialization of the world, or conforming to legalistic religion.      

Lastly, I picked my Falling Whistle, which comes from a non-profit I worked for raising funds to rehabilitate child soldiers in the Congo - it shows the ability of our generation to look past social norms and prejudices to help those that the old world sees as different than us, but we still as human. Then again, it shows how we have been socialized to view on-profits and non-profit work as a hip thing to do. I shows my American ideology, that I can tell a story, raise money, and then throw money at a problem to try and fix it, but it also shows my socialization as a Christian and a Texan, always looking to humble myself, serve justice and fight for the innocent.

Reflecting on this experience, I think about the fact that this is the third time this year that I've been asked to reflect on my own socialization. That fact causes me to think about the fact that I have to think about where I come from and how i'm formed before I can go out and expect to be able to empathize with others and understand where they've come from. The freedom that comes in understanding how you've been shaped helps give you grace for others, understanding that they too have been formed by their collective socialization. 

Along with the happy hopeful feeling that comes with doing this, I always seem to find myself getting a bit upset - whether I'm upset with the fact that we are all so gullible and susceptible to society's pressures, or that the people at the top of society would dare to socialize us in some of the ways they do, or even that we've built a society that fools people into thinking that they are different while it collectively white washes them all into consumers of whatever society is producing...I don't know; I just get annoyed and a bit frustrated thinking about it.

Then I get happy. I try to remember that there is joy in how I was formed, and that I was formed this way for a purpose. I remember that my socialization doesn't have to conclude in me eating out of society's hand, but I can become a proponent of change, and instrument of hope and justice, and when looking at socialization from my new perspective, I can find its roots and pick up my pruning shears.