We explain what a social practice is, its study and various examples. Also, what types of social practices exist.
What is a social practice?
In psychology and sociology, social practices are called the different activities that are carried out on a daily, constant and repeated basis within a community determined. They can be jobs, exercises, customs, practices or procedures that serve as an element of interconnection between complex social entities, which can range from urban tribes and lifestyles to entire societies.
social practices are a form of link between the individual and the community and differ from one culture to another, operating as implicit agreements about the way of doing things. In general, they are considered the result of tradition and the passage of historical time, since the same community varies its social practices as its notions of morality, society, identity, etc. change.
However, the adaptation or inadequacy to the social practices of a given community at a given time usually brings with it acceptance or rejection, since they have to do directly with the social structure: the set of tacit and traditional norms and principles that validate certain attitudes and procedures, while invalidating others, always depending on a context.
For example, dress codes are a type of social practice. It is not considered appropriate for a man to go to work in shorts and with a bare torso, which would be appropriate for that same individual to be, surrounded by his same co-workers, on a beach on vacation. Another example is that these codes allow a man to go bare-chested on the beach, while a woman generally does not.
Social practices, thus, have been described by scholars such as the Frenchman Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002) or his compatriot Michel Foucault (1926-1984) as part of the repressive apparatus of society, through which it legitimizes certain behaviors and disqualifies others thus imposing a specific order that grants and constrains freedoms. This order, very often, has to do with the traditional values of society.
In this way, by carrying out certain social practices, the presence of certain values in social structures can be reinforced or weakened. For example: the practice of racial or sexual discrimination in the allocation of labor, educational or political power quotas will generate a society in which racial or sexual discrimination is more pronounced and accepted as the “norm”, and therefore , imposed by the majority on individuals.
But the mechanism also works in the opposite direction: as certain discriminatory social stereotypes are broken, a more egalitarian social structure becomes more feasible, since the very notion of what is “common”, “normal” and “acceptable” is altered. ”.
Types of social practices
There are as many social practices as there are different fields of daily life, but in general they can be classified as:
- Linguistics: those that have to do with the use of language, with the ways of speaking (especially with the “cultured” language and/or with the most valued in the different environments of power) and with the phrases and expressions that are transmitted from generation to generation. in generation.
- Religious: those that have to do with the practice of a specific religion or several of them, and that are directly linked to certain forms of morality and/or ethnic identity. Furthermore, complex philosophical traditions often underlie religious practices, of which we perceive only the surface on a daily basis.
- Cultural: those that involve tradition, celebrations, folklore, national stories and group identity. In general, it refers to practices that reinforce the idea of belonging to a cultural group and tradition, that is, to a particular history. The media are important actors in this sense.
- Sports: those that are carried out around a physical activity, especially if it has spectacular dimensions, as is the case of football in many European countries or countries with European cultural affiliation.
- Technological: those that are carried out from the scenarios proposed by technological innovation, and that are especially relevant in the framework of the globalized and computerized society: social networks, the 2.0 community and other similar scenarios, allowed by new technologies of information and communications.
Continue with: Social phenomena
References
- “Social practice” in Philosophy Topics of the Government of Mexico.
- “Types of social practices” at Terra Nova Institute (Mexico).
- “Practice Theory” in Wikipedia (English).
- “Social Practice Theory (Praexology)” (video) in Conquer Imagination.
