Understanding Cultural Dynamics: A Schema-Based Approach

• In Event: 106 - Open Refereed Roundtable Session I
  In Refereed Roundtable: A. Table 02. Cultural Sociology 1

Abstract

Why do some cultural meanings evolve, while others seem more resistant to change? As it stands, the field of cultural sociology currently lacks a model for understanding the dynamics of cultural meaning. Instead, cultural meaning has tended to be alternatively viewed as the outcome of exogenous, structural changes; or (more recently) as stable values and motivations driving action (Vaisey 2009; Vaisey and Lizardo 2010). This has left a gap in our understanding of endogenous mechanisms involved in the maintenance, transmission and evolution of cultural meaning—that is, of “the internal mechanisms governing cultural processes, more generally,” (Kaufman 2004: 337; Ghaziani 2009; Pugh 2013). To fill this gap, I draw on insights from work in cognitive anthropology (Sperber 1996; Strauss and Quinn 1997), in concert with work in cognitive cultural sociology (DiMaggio 1997; Cerulo 2010) to propose a schema-based model of cultural dynamics. Potential implications of the model for future research in cultural sociology and other subfields are discussed.

Author

• M.B. Fallin Hunzaker, Duke University