Re: better late?

Paul Dillon (dillonph who-is-at northcoast.com)
Tue, 28 Sep 1999 10:08:26 -0700

Mike,

the question about enculturation/stratification is somewhat difficult
because lots of societies without permanent strata are known to us ; e.g.,
many native north american societies, the siberian peoples (e.g., Yakut,
Tungus, etc.), Pygmies, in fact any society where leadership was not at
least hereditary: New Guinea big-man societies, etc. Obviously there can be
no enculturation/stratification if there is no stratification to begin with.
But as far as specialized roles in relation to the educational process,
perhaps the education of shamans might provide a clue as to what it might
look like.

i'd be willing to bet that once there are permanent social strata,
educational systems spring into place to reproduce them. (this could all be
quickly answered if I had access to the online HRAF files, but maybe you do
and also know someone with the time to answer the question.

Paul H. Dillon

-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Cole <mcole who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu>
To: xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
Date: Tuesday, September 28, 1999 9:45 AM
Subject: better late?

>
>Hello All-- I am having trouble keeping up with the standards/retention
>issue despite my interest in it. But Eugene's note about his class's
>idea of fairness struck me as key, reflecting remarks I made yesterday:
>
>So, failure of ones is success of
>others.
>
>Right. The educational system is a social institution that simultaneously
>seeks to make everybody succeed AND which acts as a social sorting
>mechanism (not the only one, but certainly one) to make legitimize the
>status of those who fail.
>
>Is there a society known to XMCA members, either at present or in the
>past, where socialization/enculturation practices do not/did not relate
>social stratification, dominance, and all those nasty things associated
>with low social status? A good working counter example might clarify the
>discussion.
>mike
>