Neighbor, A Handbook: Part 2(e), The Terms-Social and Cultural Norms

“Unity, not uniformity, must be our aim. We attain unity only through variety. Differences must be integrated, not annihilated, not absorbed.” — Mary Parker Follett

Definition

Cultural norms are referenced throughout this book, though sometimes I refer to them as social norms. Either way, I mean relatively the same thing unless I note otherwise. The definitions in the box below will help you unpack the meaning, no matter the language used.

Culture: “The customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group” (Dictionary. com)

Social: “Relating to society or its organization” (Dictionary.com)

Norm: “Something that is usual, typical, expected” (Dictionary.com)

Cultural/Social Norms: the behaviors that a particular nation, people, or other social group expect of its members because those behaviors have been officially or unofficially determined to be right or the way things are done (by that nation, people, or social group).

Cultural and social norms are the behaviors that a particular nation, people, or other social group expect of its people. This expectation can be conscious (we’re aware of it) or unconscious (it’s happening, but we don’t realize it). These behaviors have been (officially or unofficially) determined to be right or the way things are done.

They’re norms because they are expected, they’re thought of as normal, and the expectations can be right there in front of our faces as a rule or a law or so subtle they’re practically invisible. As a result, cultural and social norms can be enforced by someone official — in schools, religions, government, or on the streets by our police officers– or by the sideways glance or tsk tsk of a grandmother or even a stranger.

Official or unofficial, cultural norms are determined by the people who are in power, though not necessarily by those in elected power. This is because cultural norms are largely determined by the people with the social power.

An Example

A relatively simple example is the way we dress. You know:

Dress for success. Put your best foot forward. The suit makes the man.

Though the amount of money humans spend on shopping reveals how much we believe we’re defined by our personal fashion sense, the fact is that we usually dress according to the social norms that surround us. These are set by the people in our group with social/cultural power.

If we rose up to 30,000 feet (like we’re in an airplane looking down) to study the big picture — a group of people in a town, church, school, etc — we would see very little true variation in their basic style of dress. Think about it, in some places most people wear snap-button shirts, in others people wear their pants below their bottoms, in others people blow dry their hair big and then one state away they wear it long and straight to the middle of their back. We might see pricey exercise clothing or a lot of flannel and beanies.

This understanding first hit me when I was on a bus, chaperoning a school trip in Boston. Watching the street scenes pass by, I saw a couple of people talking together. They had such cool and individual fashion styles that I sat up and took notice. I was filled with admiration for how unique these two people looked, their distinctive dress and hair and overall aura. The bus continued along and suddenly there were more and more people dressed in this same manner and soon we were passing the Berkeley College of Music. Gathered under the windows and spilling down the steps of the front entrance were tons of students who were all “unique” in the same fabulous way as the first two. They all dressed based on the norms of the group. I laughed out loud.

Even these cool people had a unique look that was socially normed.

Behavior

Social and cultural norms can be small, like how we pass people on the sidewalk, if we talk loudly or quietly in public, if we bow our head when we enter a religious institution or take off our shoes or cover our shoulders or raise our hands over our head in praise. It can be ok to kiss in public or not. It can be ok for men to hug or only ok for them to do that thing where they clasp a hand and bump shoulders. Maybe even that’s too much, and so they simply jam their hands in their pockets and stand side by side muttering men things.

Physicality, our physical way(s) of being in the world, is in part socially and culturally normed. The teaching of how to be starts in a family and then extends outside each front door, and over the years, we are taught and we are taught and we are taught.

Why recognize them

Social and cultural norms are important to discover and understand. This is critical because norms are visible and invisible dictators of how we behave and how we see the world. Visible dictators are dangerous, as history has shown. But invisible dictators can be even worse.

The reason unexamined norms are dangerous is that they guide our behavior and beliefs without our realizing how or why. When norms are invisible, they create group think with no real reasoning. This thinking can go from influencing more surface decisions (big truck or hybrid vehicle?) to determining what is seen as morally right and wrong. When we don’t see the root cause of our thoughts or beliefs, we just buy in.

Just as social/cultural norms can norm a behavior as good, they can just as easily norm it as bad — bad as in that person has no values, that person is evil, that person is going to hell, God hates that person.

We often blindly accept social and cultural norms because we don’t really realize they exist or even that someone, sometime, created them. Instead, we think: this is the way it is, or that is the way to behave.

Some gender norms as an example

Look now at just a few gender-based examples of how we’re guided by cultural and social norms. When I was growing up (and it’s still true today, though times are changing, but look within and without), women were not supposed to put themselves forward. This wasn’t always stated, but that cultural norm was actively enforced and reinforced. Here’s an example: if a woman was professionally forceful in business, she was considered aggressive and too much (maybe even the B word). The same type of behavior from a man made him strong and powerful. The word aggressive when applied to a man had a respectful tone (it’s good for a man to be aggressive, he makes things happen!) and was a negative judgment when used for a woman.

This kind of social norming conditions not only our behaviors but the expectations and actions of the people around us.

Now, I’ll speak as both a teacher and a mom (and a former girl). This norming starts early. In the classroom, as an example, studies show (and I’ve seen) that boys are expected to forget to raise their hand and shout out the answer. Boys will be boys. But girls are reprimanded for this very same behavior. Or take the word bossy. This word is only used for girls. Make no mistake, bossy’s a negative word, a shaming. But this exact same behavior from boys is expected. It’s called leadership.

The teaching is so deep in us that, without doing our awareness work, we don’t even know we’re judging the girls’ and boys’ behavior in such different ways.

There are countless studies of what happens to a girl’s voice as she moves from early elementary toward middle school. Over time, girls are supposed to stop playing sports at recess, whereas boys are expected to keep playing. The dress expectations become more defined, and the girls’ dress turns feminine even if some really want to keep playing sports at recess. By middle school, studies show that a girl’s voice in the classroom has been largely silenced, and her academic successes are achieved quietly (or left behind as threatening to her social standing).

Teasing intensifies as a means of keeping social norms in place. A quiet or gentle or unathletic boy is suspect as is a girl who calls out answers, dresses like a boy, or is high achieving.

Most of these norms are controlled socially by the kids and the clothing available in the stores, culturally by the teachers and parents and groups). It’s often unconscious, as there are no actual policies that say it’s ok for boys to call out in class or wrong for girls to wear basketball shorts and a tshirt.

Sometimes norms can be seen more officially in things like the sheer number of items listed in a girl’s section of the school dress code versus a boy’s. Sometimes they aren’t official at all, like how a boy being excused for a highschool game is more easily accepted by a teacher than a girl with the same commitment. Or, the very different size of the crowd at a girls’ vs boys’ sporting event. And which gender has a school funded team of kids in official uniforms, trained to leap around and cheer for them?

Though the tip of the iceberg, these few examples show how this social/cultural messaging rolls with children as they grow into adults. It’s no wonder there are both men and women who will openly say that women aren’t suited to be president (and then call a woman who might be a B–). Or feel suspicious of a man who wants to teach kindergarten or be a nurse because they’ve been taught women are better at caretaking. There are even those who would say a man teaching kindergarten or being a nurse isn’t natural.

In my own personal world, I witnessed example after example of unconscious social and cultural norms influencing and creating the world around us. This began from the moment I said I was pregnant, when questions about the gender of my baby led to unconscious comments and conscious gifts. Fast forward: do you want to guess which of my kids got trucks and truck books versus dolls and pink clothing? Who was offered the babysitting offers, even though my children both love kids and are equally amazing with them? No neighbor ever came by and asked, Does your son babysit? They asked if he was available for hauling or mowing. I would have to suggest him as an option, and the response I got was often quite something to witness.

Law/rule based norms

While many norms are kept unofficially by one person responding to another, some norms are established, or at least reinforced, by laws or official rules. When we live with things as law, we might not notice the norms that underpin them. This is especially true if we’re in the power group. The power group is the one that unofficially calls the shots and isn’t negatively impacted by the laws. They are the group of privilege (next chapter).

An example of a law exists in Baltimore, where there’s still a law on the books that more than two women cannot rent an apartment together unless there’s also a man. This dates back to the day when leaders worried about scandalous or illegal sexual behavior. As a result, today, young college students or professionals who need three roommates to afford an apartment must either lie, find a male roommate, or have their parents’ rent the place for them. Three guys can rent an apartment with no problem. What’s interesting here is not only the old cultural norms complicating women making their way academically and professionally in the world, but that this law hasn’t yet become a priority for lawmakers to change, despite it being a hardship for young women (and flipping ridiculous). That lack of action, too, reflects a cultural norm. While I have no proof, I suggest that if it was illegal for three plus men to rent a place together, that law would have changed long ago.

On the rule side of norm enforcement, schools and religions, for example, have official dress codes that are created by the leaders. These codes represent the cultural norms for what each gender must wear to be ‘appropriate.’ If someone breaks them, they’re punished.

Another example are clubs that don’t allow members who aren’t White or straight or Christian. This rule may have been removed from their official book, but can remain an unspoken norm of the club. If I’m White and Christian and heterosexual, I’m much less likely to notice it, unless I have a friend who’s a person of color or gay or not Christian who a) points out who’s in my club and who’s not or b) tells me they’d like to join and I’m suddenly uncomfortable or concerned they’ll get turned down.

Justifying norms

To support social/cultural norms, we’ve created language to explain them. They just don’t really fit in, aren’t really our people, won’t make everyone comfortable, wouldn’t feel comfortable, probably can’t live up to the financial commitment, the last person didn’t work out, it’s not a big deal, there’s another place where they’ll feel more comfortable, it’s just not right to…etc.

Discovering norms around us

If any of us are in a country club or religion or neighborhood or whatever group, look around and ask is everyone like me? This is always a good exercise. If you read the group loyalty section, you know that people tend to get together with similar people, so everyone being like you can happen in a way that feels organic.

But it’s not always organic. People who are unlike the group can very quietly be made to feel unwelcome, even if it’s as simple as others not saying hello or only saying the briefest of hellos before moving on to who’s comfortable. The extremes of this are when social opportunities, like a great pool or golf course, or professional opportunities like jobs or promotions, are available to only a specific group.

If you’re solidly a member of the group that unofficially, or officially, sets the rules, it’s difficult to know that others aren’t. Because you feel like you fit in your world, it feels like others would feel this way, too. So it’s important to look and ask and think, and repeat, and repeat again.

Norms touch everything

Social norms touch, and can even control, everything. The work we do, the way we choose to appear physically, who we’re friends with, who we love, how we vote, what we drive, where we go on vacation, who we choose to guide us, the way we talk, the way we worship, what we talk about and how we talk about it. Social norms can even determine who we hate and who we trust. They are so easy to take for granted, especially when we aren’t hurt by them. It’s so easy to write off other people’s complaints.

Has anyone ever heard a woman complain that only the women get up after Thanksgiving dinner and do the dishes? Has anyone seen the situation remain unchanged despite the obvious truth of the complaint? I know in my family I’ve had to create an assignment sheet that includes all of us because the unfairness of these norms when spoken aloud has only been met by chuckles and eyerolls, and no one who was male got off the couch unless active intervention/shaming took place. Social and cultural norms bring comfort to those they serve and so whenever any of us fit that category we have to work extra hard to pull back and take an honest look.

If we don’t pull back and ask:

• What’s ok to do and say in my town, friend group, church, political party, etc, and what isn’t?
• How do I really feel about that?
• Does it truly reflect who I am and what my deepest (Neighbor) values are?

we will be forever controlled by something outside of our control.

Social and cultural norms do not have to control us or the world around us. We can make things change.

Wrapping it up

To close, a social or cultural norm is an expected behavior or way of thinking that’s created and reinforced by a set of people. In a rigid society or culture, things outside that norm are considered wrong. That wrongness can come from very subtle messaging over generations. Rigid societies and cultures don’t usually know they’re rigid, so if any of us begins to recognize we’re a member of a society or culture that has some rigid beliefs and rules, be open to recognizing it.

Social and cultural norms spring from an important place — the ordering of a livable society. Social norms, like kindness to strangers or not spitting on the sidewalk, can create a peaceful and healthy society.

But unexamined, over time they give some people or groups more power than others. They can even serve as a way of keeping people in line.

Social and cultural norms that determine a right way of being and name/imply other ways as wrong, or make a person outside those norms feel unsafe, are not created with the goal of being a Neighbor.

So, notice when the way a person is or acts feels wrong or makes you uncomfortable. Ask, why is that? Where is my discomfort coming from? Then push deeper. Ask, is my discomfort real or just what I’ve been taught I should feel? Might there be more than one way to act, dress, speak, be?

Neighbor: a Handbook is written with the hope of de-weaponizing both contemporary ‘hot’ language and our current divisive human practices in order to bring us together as Neighbors, working with one another for the whole. I’m releasing it one chapter at a time, and the first chapter is “Part One: Introduction.” If you’re enjoying Neighbor and haven’t yet followed me on Medium, please feel free to click the ‘follow’ option. If you’d like to receive an email when a new chapter is released, there’s an email icon next to the follow button that will make this happen. And of course, please feel free to share this book with anyone you feel would enjoy or benefit from it. Our Neighbor work extends beyond each of us, so if you share it, please do so with Love. Most of all, thanks for traveling with me. I wish you well.