Unit I: The Self From Various Perspectives - Lesson 1: Philosophy PDF

UNIT I: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES Lesson 1: Philosophy 2.5 weeks or 7.5 hours Philosophy employs the inquisitive mind to discover the ultimate causes, reasons, and principles of everything. It goes beyond scientific investigation by exploring all areas of knowledge such as religion, psychology, politics, physics, and even medicine. Hence, the etymological definition of philosophy "love of wisdom" could pertain to the desire for truth by formulating never ending questions to provide answers to every inquiry about the nature of human existence. The nature of the self is a topic of interest among philosophers. The philosophical framework for understanding the self was first introduced by the ancient great Greek philosophers Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. In particular, Socrates suggests: "Know thyself" But what exactly does "know thyself" mean? What is self and the qualities that define it? This lesson presents an overview of the philosophical perspective of the self to assist students identify one's own self to gain self-knowledge. It intends to give a wider perspective in understanding the self. The different views of prominent philosophers regarding the nature of the self are discussed and while there are disagreements in how philosophers view the self, most of them agree that self-knowledge is a prerequisite to a happy and meaningful life. At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. discuss and explore the concept of the self from the different philosophical perspective; 2. appreciate the contribution of each philosophical perspective to a better understanding of the self; 3. examine oneself on how the philosophical perspectives on the self are applied; and 4. make a personal philosophy of the self. 1 Do You Truly Know Yourself? Answer the following questions about yourself as fully and precisely as you can. 1. How would you characterize yourself? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 2. What makes you stand out from the rest? What makes your self special? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 3. How has your self transformed itself? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 4. How is your self connected to your body? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 5. How is your self related to other selves? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 6. What will happen to your self after you die? ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 2 1. Were you able to answer the questions above with ease? Why? Which questions did you find easiest to answer? Which ones are difficult? Why? Questions Easy or difficult to Why? answer? 2. How can one truly know the self? 3 Philosophy as a subject presents various philosophers offering multiple perspectives on just about any topic including the self. Philosophical, discussion of the self is a basic search for meaning and purpose in life. Determination, rationalization, and identification of the self set the direction from which an individual travels to fulfill his or her purpose in life. The inability to define oneself leads to a lot of contradictions within the self later on; hence, it is one of the many imperatives in life to know oneself and to go on with the business of leading a life charted by oneself. Socrates No historical document proves that Socrates really existed. We only know Socrates because his illustrious students (from Plato to Aristotle) spoke eloquently and generously about his wit, intellect, and wisdom. Socrates left no known writings, but his highly regarded student, Plato, wrote extensively about him. Some would even claim that Plato, in positing his own radical ideas in his era, spoke through the character of Socrates in his writings. Despite this mystery in his identity, Socrates is credited for his many contributions to western philosophy. Socrates reminds us to "know thyself," a translation of an ancient Greek aphorism gnothi Seauton, Socrates posited that if a person knows who he or she is, all basic issues and difficulties in life will vanish and everything will be clearer and simpler. One could now act according to his or her own definition of the self without any doubt and contradiction. His technique of asking basic questions such as "Who am I?" "What is the purpose of my life?," "What am I doing here?" or "What is justice?" are all predicated on the fact that humans must be able to define these simple things so as to move forward and act accordingly based on their definition of the self. Self knowledge, for Socrates, means knowing one's degree of understanding about the world and knowing one's capabilities and potentials. It is only through self-knowledge that one's self emerges. Therefore, self is achieved and not just discovered, something to work on and not a product of a mere realization. For Socrates, possession of knowledge is virtue and ignorance is vice. He argued that a person's acceptance of ignorance is a springboard for the acquisition of knowledge later on. So, one must first have the humility to acknowledge his or her ignorance so as to acquire knowledge. (“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”) Answers will always be subjective and there is no right or wrong answer to the questions posited by Socrates. The quality and quantity of answers are dependent on the person answering these basic inquiries and one's subsequent actions are best understood on how one defines oneself, thus the constant reminder to "know thyself." For Socrates, every man is composed of body and soul. This means that every human person is dualistic, that is, he is composed of two important aspects of his personhood. For Socrates, this means all individuals have an imperfect, impermanent aspect to him, and the body, while maintaining that there is also a soul that is perfect and permanent. He argued that the ruler of the body is the soul. For him, soul pre-existed the body, and soul is what makes the body alive. 4 Plato An ancient Greek philosopher who was a student of Socrates and a teacher of Aristotle, Plato produced a substantial body of work that became the basis for western thought. He basically took off from his master and supported the idea that man is a dual nature of body and soul. In addition to what Socrates earlier espoused, Plato added that there are three components of the soul: the rational soul, the spirited soul, and the appetitive soul. In his magnum opus, "The Republic" (Plato 2000), Plato emphasizes that justice in the human person can only be attained if the three parts of the soul are working harmoniously with one another. The rational soul forged by reason and intellect has to govern the affairs of the human person, the spirited part which is in charge of emotions should be kept at bay, and the appetitive soul in charge of basic desires like eating, drinking, sleeping, and having sex are controlled as well. When this ideal state is attained, then the human person's soul becomes just and virtuous. In terms of the concept of the self, Plato was one of the first philosophers who believed in an enduring self that is represented by the soul. He argued that the soul is eternal and constitutes the enduring self, because even after death, the soul continues to exist. St. Augustine Augustine's view of the human person reflects the entire spirit of the medieval world when it comes to man. Following the ancient view of Plato and infusing it with the newfound doctrine of Christianity, Augustine agreed that man is of a bifurcated nature. An aspect of man dwells in the world and is imperfect and continuously yearns to be with the Divine and the other is capable of reaching immortality. The body is bound to die on earth and the soul is to anticipate living eternally in a realm of spiritual bliss in communion with God. This is because the body can only thrive in the imperfect, physical reality that is the world, whereas the soul can also stay after death in an eternal realm with the all- transcendent God. The goal of every human person is to attain this communion and bliss with the Divine by living his life on earth in virtue. However, Augustine in his Confessions takes this idea and expands it into an entire genre that critically inquires what it means to be a person. In other words, he explores the idea of the self until he discovers personal subjectivity. As Augustine constructs a view of God that would come to dominate Western thinking, he also creates a new concept of individual identity: the idea of the self. This identity is achieved through a twofold process: self-presentation, which leads to self-realization. Augustine creates a literary character out of the self and places it in a narrative text so that it becomes part of the grand allegory of redemption. In The 5 Confessions, Augustine plays the lead role in the story of his own life. By telling this tale he transforms himself into a metaphor of the struggle of both body and soul to find happiness, which exists only in God’s love. He reads his life as an allegory to arrive at a larger truth. Rene Descartes Rene Descartes, Father of Modern Philosophy conceived of the human person as having a body and a mind. In his famous treatise, The Meditations of First Philosophy, he claims that there is so much that we should doubt. In fact, he says that since much of what we think and believe are not infallible, they may turn out to be false. One should only believe that since which can pass the test of doubt (Descartes 2008). If something is so clear and lucid as not to be even doubted, then that is the only time when one should actually buy a proposition. In the end, Descartes thought that the only thing that one cannot doubt is the existence of the self, for even if one doubts oneself, that only proves that there is a doubting self, a thing that thinks and therefore, that cannot be doubted. Thus, his famous, cogito ergo sum, "I think therefore, I am." The fact that one thinks should lead one to conclude without a trace of doubt that he exists. The self then for Descartes is also a combination of two distinct entities, the cogito, the thing that thinks, which is the mind, and the extenza or extension of the mind, which is the body. In Descartes's view, the body is nothing else but a machine that is attached to the mind. The human person has it but it is not what makes man a man. If at all, that is the mind. Descartes says, "But what then, am I? A thinking thing. It has been said. But what is a thinking thing? It is a thing that doubts, understands (conceives), affirms, denies, wills, refuses; that imagines also, and perceives" (Descartes 2008). For Descartes, the existence of anything that you register from your senses can be doubted. For example, if you are staring at a burning building, you are not certain if that building is really burning or it is something you are only reconstructing from your dream. One can always doubt about the certainty of things but the very fact that one doubts is something that cannot be doubted. This is what "I think, therefore I am" means. The self, for Descartes, is nothing else but a mind-body dichotomy. Thought (mind) always precedes action (body). It has always been in that sequence. Everything starts with a thought. Humans think first about doing something and then do it. When one thinks that he or she will have a very busy week, then he or she will plan what to do from Monday to Sunday. It is the thought that sets direction to human actions but humans are always free to choose. So, if one says he or she will have a very busy week, then he or she can push through with the tasks he or she needs to do for the week or not. Humans are self-aware and being such proves their own place in the universe. Humans create their own reality and they are the masters of their own universe. Western philosophy is largely based on the writings of Descartes. If you have heard of the saying that man is a rational animal, one is actually positing the ideas of Rene Descartes. To acknowledge him, Filipinos have a unique term, "diskarte," a derivative of the surname of Descartes, which denotes finding a way or making things possible. 6 John Locke John Locke's main philosophy about personal identity or the self is founded on consciousness or memory. For Locke, consciousness is the perception of what passes in a Man's own mind. He rejected that brain has something to do with consciousness as the brain, as well as the body may change, while consciousness remains the same. He concluded that personal identity is not in the brain but in one's consciousness. In his work, "Identity and Diversity” in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), he pondered, if the same substance which thinks be changed, it can be the same person, or remaining the same, it can be a different person." Here, he supports that consciousness can be transferred from one substance (body and soul) to another. While the soul is changed, for instance, consciousness remains the same, thereby maintaining the personal identity through the change. On the other hand, consciousness may be lost involuntarily through forgetfulness while the soul stays the same. With this, he claimed that there is the same soul but a different person. Thus, the same soul is unnecessary or insufficient in the formation of one's personal identity over time when consciousness is lost. His philosophy can be understood easily in his illustration of “The Prince and the Cobbler." Suppose a prince will die and have its soul resurrected in the body of a cobbler whose soul has departed. With this exchange, the prince will still act and think as a prince even though he finds himself in a new body. This idea supports the possibility that the same person may appear in a different body at the time of resurrection and yet still be the same person. Locke’s other remarkable contribution was the notion of tabula rasa. This concept posits that everyone started as a blank slate, and the content is provided by one's experiences over time. David Hume David Hume a Scottish philosopher, has a very unique way of looking at man. As an empiricist who believes that one can know only what comes from the senses and experiences, Hume argues that the self is nothing like what his predecessors thought of it. The self is not an entity over and beyond the physical body. One can rightly see here the empiricism that runs through his veins. Empiricism is the school of thought that espouses the idea that knowledge can only be possible if it is sensed and experienced. Men can only attain knowledge by experiencing. For example, Jack knows that Jill is another human person not because he has seen her soul. He knows she is just like him because he sees her, hears her, and touches her. 7 To David Hume, the self is nothing else but a bundle of impressions. What are impressions? For David Hume, if one tries to examine his experiences, he finds that they can all be categorized into two: impressions and ideas. Impressions are the basic objects of our experience or sensation. They therefore form the core of our thoughts. When one touches an ice cube, the cold sensation is an impression Impressions therefore are vivid because they are products of our direct experience with the world. Ideas, on the other hand, are copies of impressions. Because of this they are not as lively and vivid as our impressions. When one imagines the feeling of being in love for the first time that still is an idea. For David Hume, there is no self as a mental entity for “what we call a mind is nothing but a heap or collection of different perceptions…” The self is a bundle of perceptions (objects of the mind) of interrelated events. The assumption of a self as mental entity and thus as mental substance does not exist (Northoff, 2013). Hume's materialism views the soul as a product of the imagination. There is no primordial substance that houses the self. Any concept of the self is simply memory and imagination. Hume stressed that there is no stable thing called self, for the self is nothing but a complex set of successive impressions or perceptions. If you are looking for a self, you can't find it; the only thing that you can discover is a set of individual impressions like happiness or sadness, hotness or coldness, hunger or fullness, hate or love, and many others. What you think and what you feel constitute what you are at this very moment. So, if at this moment, you are happy, then you are happy. If you are hungry, then you are hungry. That is what you are; that is who you are. What is the self then? Self, according to Hume, is simply “a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement”. (Hume and Steinberg 1992) Men simply want to believe that there is a unified, coherent self, a soul or mind just like what the previous philosophers thought. In reality, what one thinks is a unified self is simply a combination of all experiences with a particular person. 8 Immanuel Kant German philosopher Immanuel Kant theorized that consciousness is formed by one's inner and outer sense. The inner sense is comprised of one's psychological state and intellect. The outer sense consists of one's senses and the physical world. Consciousness of oneself and of one's psychological state (or inner sense) was referred to by Kant as empirical self- consciousness while consciousness of oneself and of one's state via acts of apperception is called transcendental apperception. The source of empirical self-consciousness is the inner sense. All representational states are in the inner sense such as moods, feelings, and sensations including pleasure and pain. One must be phenomenally conscious to be aware of something in the inner sense. Apperception is the faculty that allows for application of concepts. The act of apperceiving allows one to synthesize or make sense of a unified object. Transcendental apperception makes experience possible and allows the self and the world to come together. Consciousness being unified, Kant argued, is the central feature of the mind (Brook, 2013). Mind should perform both the unity of consciousness and the unity of apperception. Consciousness makes the world intelligible. It is the self that organizes sensations and thoughts into a picture that makes sense to a person. This picture constitutes the "you" at the center of the universe, looking at the universe from one's point of view. For example, think about a moment when you shared memorable experiences with someone but each of you had radically different experiences-swimming, attending reunion, or walking at a party. Reflect on the way each person instinctively describes the situation from his or her perspective. This is the unity of consciousness that Kant described. The self is able to perform this synthesizing and unifying function because it transcends sense experience. Kant recognizes the veracity of Hume's account that everything starts with perception and sensation of impressions. However, Kant thinks that the things that men perceive around them are not just randomly infused into the human person without an organizing principle that regulates the relationship of all these impressions. To Kant, there is necessarily a mind that organizes the impressions that men get from the external world. Time and space, for example, are ideas that one cannot find in the world, but is built in our minds. Kant calls these the apparatuses of the mind. Along with the different apparatuses of the mind goes the "self." Without the self, one cannot organize the different impressions that one gets in relation to his own existence. Kant therefore suggests that it is an actively engaged intelligence in man that synthesizes all knowledge and experience. Thus, the self is not just what gives one his personality. In addition, it is also the seat of knowledge acquisition for all human persons. Sigmund Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory 9 Freud emphasized the inner dynamics of unconscious motives. He asserted that the sex urges in the unconscious constitute the main human drive. This is known as the “libido” theory. Many human desires are directed and complicated by unconscious motives which we are not directly aware of because they lie in the substrata of our consciousness but which are nevertheless powerful drives that may dominate our lives. Basic to Freud’s theory is the conception that the unacceptable (forbidden, punished} wishes/desires of childhood principally libidinal (sexual) are repressed in our consciousness or get driven out of awareness. Repressed drives press to find expression in dreams, slips of speech, and in unconscious mannerisms. They are the reasons for many of our inner conflicts in life. Freud believed that all human behavior is energized by psychodynamic forces. One needs psychic energy in order to satisfy his basic urges. He viewed human as an inherently negative creature who is relentlessly “driven” by two kinds of biological instincts (or motives). Two Kinds of Biological Instincts 1. Eros or life instinct – helps the individual survive; directs life-sustaining activities. Ex. respiration, eating, sex 2. Thanatos or death instinct – is viewed as the destructive forces present in all human beings. Ex. destructive acts like arson, murder, war Freud’s Structure of the Human Mind According to Sigmund Freud, our personality develops from the interactions among what he proposed as the three fundamental structures of the human mind: the id, ego, and superego. Three Components/Structures of the Mind 1. id – the most primitive of the three structures, is concerned with instant gratification of basic physical needs and urges without fear of consequences nor regard for discipline or control. It operates by the pleasure principle; it includes all the erotic cravings including sex drives, pleasure drives, aggressive drives, and other instinctual forces which seek expression. The id occupies the unconscious level of the mind, and when a person is id-dominated, he is aggressive, self- centered, sadistic, arrogant and ambitious for himself alone. 10 For example, if your id walked past a stranger eating ice cream, it would most likely take the ice cream for itself. It doesn’t know, or care, that it is rude to take something belonging to someone else; it would care only that you wanted the ice cream. 2. superego – Moral Arm of Personality or obey the morality principle. It is concerned with social rules and morals. It represents the ideal, and strives for perfection rather than pleasure or for reality. It also serves as the conscience. It develops as a child learns what their culture considers right and wrong. Example: If your superego walked past the same stranger, it would not take their ice cream because it would know that that would be rude. However, if both your id and your superego were involved, and your id was strong enough to override your superego’s concern, you would still take the ice cream, but afterward you would most likely feel guilt and shame over your actions. 3. ego – In contrast to the instinctual id and the moral superego, the ego is the rational, pragmatic part of our personality. It obeys the reality principle and block the id’s irrational thinking. It delays gratification and find realistic ways of gratifying the instinct. It is less primitive than the id and is partly conscious and partly unconscious. It’s what Freud considered to be the “self,” and its job is to balance the demands of the id and superego in the practical context of reality. So, if you walked past the stranger with ice cream one more time, your ego would mediate the conflict between your id (“I want that ice cream right now”) and superego (“It’s wrong to take someone else’s ice cream”) and decide to go buy your own ice cream. While this may mean you have to wait 10 more minutes, which would frustrate your id, your ego decides to make that sacrifice as part of the compromise– satisfying your desire for ice cream while also avoiding an unpleasant social situation and potential feelings of shame. Conflict within the mind: According to Freud, the job of the ego is to balance the aggressive/pleasure-seeking drives of the id with the moral control of the superego. Conflicts among these three structures, and our efforts to find balance among what each of them “desires,” determines how we behave and approach the world. What balance 11 we strike in any given situation determines how we will resolve the conflict between two overarching behavioral tendencies: our biological aggressive and pleasure-seeking drives vs. our socialized internal control over those drives. Freud's Three Levels of Mind Freud delineated the mind in the distinct levels, each with their own roles and functions. Freud likened the three levels of mind to an iceberg. 1. The conscious mind contains all of the thoughts, sensations, memories, feelings, and wishes of which we are aware at any given moment. This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can think and talk about rationally. This also includes our memory, which is not always part of consciousness but can be retrieved easily and brought into awareness. It is likened to the tip of an iceberg that you can see above the water. 2. The preconscious mind includes thoughts, feelings, sensations, or memories we are not aware of at the The mind is like an iceberg-mostly hidden. moment, but may be brought to consciousness. Compared to the part of the iceberg that is submerged below the water, but is still visible. 3. The unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and repressed memories, instincts and wishes we are not aware of or that are outside of our conscious awareness. The unconscious contains contents that are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict. The bulk of the iceberg that lies unseen beneath the waterline represents the unconscious. Gilbert Ryle 12 Gilbert Ryle, a British philosopher, opposed Rene Descartes that the self is a "thinking thing." He maintained that the mind is not separate from the body (mind-body dichotomy). Mind consists of dispositions of people based on what they know, what they feel, what they want, and so on. People learn that they have their own minds because they behave in certain ways. What truly matters is the behavior that a person manifests in his day-to-day life. For Ryle, looking for and trying to understand a self as it really exists is like visiting your friend’s university and looking for the "university." One can roam around the campus, visit the library and the football field, and meet the administrators and faculty and still end up not finding the "university." This is because the campus, the people, the systems, and the territory all form the university. Ryle suggests that the "self is not an entity one can locate and analyze but simply the convenient name that people use to refer to all the behaviors that people make. Ryle supported the basic notions of behavioristic psychology. His theory is called logical behaviorism or analytical behaviorism-a theory of mind which states that mental concepts can be understood through observable events. In his work Concept of Mind (1949), he described Descartes’ mind-body dualism as "ghost in the machine." For him, Descartes idea is a category mistake supporting that there is an immaterial mind in a material body. Descartes thought that one has soul in the body that possesses talents, memories, and character. The properties of a person are better understood as adjectives modifying a body, than as noun (objects) parallel to it. Kindness, for example, is not a thing that exists apart from and parallel to the body, but rather a collection of properties a body has. Kindness includes properties such as being generous, humble, courteous, loyal, and honest. Someone who never exhibited any of these traits would not be called kind; and anyone who is considered kind exhibits some of these traits. The only proof of the mind's operation is visible and evident in activities like singing, running, walking, and the like. Knowing and believing are just dispositions but these influence people's actions. To understand Ryle's illustration of the mind, think of this scenario: You went to a forest and you saw the trees, animals, falls, and caves. You might ask, "Where is the forest?" This is similar to asking, "Where is the mind?" All the things you saw is the forest. Therefore, the disposition to know, believe, feel, and act is called the mind. As for Ryle's concept of the self, the self is a combination of the mind and the body. While the focus of other philosophers is towards the separation of mind and body (a dualist view), for Ryle, self is taken as a whole with the combination of the body and the mind. Ryle also posited the maxim, "I act, therefore I am." For him, the mind is not the seat of self but the behavior, opposing Descartes' immaterial mind in a material body. The self is the way people behave. Paul Churchland and Patricia Churchland Paul Churchland and Patricia Churchland, who are both neuroscientists, introduced eliminative materialism-"a radical claim that ordinary, common sense understanding of the mind is deeply wrong and that some or all of the mental states posited by common sense 13 do not actually exist" (Ramsey, 2013). For theme it is false to claim that folk psychology, or common sense psychology, is the capacity to explain mental states of people. Most people think that we have a stream of consciousness that contains images and conceptions of things about which we have beliefs and attitudes. Our beliefs and attitudes are supported by our feelings, which include mental states like joy and sorrow, or anxiety and relief. It is also a folk belief that our sense of the world and of ourselves is a direct representation of how the world is formed, thus making our bodies reflect or adapt the way the world is (Weed, 2011). The Churchlands argued that talk of mental states would eventually be abandoned in favor of a radically different view of how the brain works not identified with mental states. For them, self is nothing else but brain, or simply, the self is contained entirely within the physical brain. In Patricia Churchland's book Touching a Nerve: The Self as Brain (2013), she wrote: "My brain and I are inseparable. I am who I am because my brain is what it is. Even so, I often think about my brain in terms different from those I use when thinking about myself. I think about my brain as that, and about myself as me. I think about my brain as having neurons, but I think of me as having a memory. Still, I know that my memory is all about the neurons in my brain. Lately, I think about my brain in more intimate terms-as me." This supports the idea that to understand the self, one must study the brain, not just the mind. Maurice Merleau-Ponty 14 Maurice Merleau-Ponty is a French phenomenological philosopher who asserts that the mind-body bifurcation that has been going on for a long time is a futile endeavor and an invalid problem. Unlike Ryle who simply denies the "self," Merleau-Ponty instead says that the mind and body are so intertwined that they cannot be separated from one another. One cannot find any experience that is not an embodied experience. All experience is embodied. One's body is his opening toward his existence to the world. Because of these bodies, men are in the world. Merleau-Ponty dismisses the Cartesian Dualism that has spelled so much devastation in the history of man. For him, the Cartesian problem is nothing else but plain misunderstanding. The living body, his thoughts, emotions, and experiences are all one. He distinguished the body into two types: the subjective body, as lived and experienced, and the objective body, as observed and scientifically investigated. For him, these two are not different bodies." The former is the body as-it-is-lived. He wrote, "But I am not in front of my body, I am in my body, or rather I am my body.” He regarded self as embodied subjectivity. It sees human beings neither as disembodied minds (existing without body) nor as complex machines, but as living creatures whose subjectivity (consciousness) is actualized in the forms of their physical involvement with the world. The body is the general medium for having a world and we know not through our intellect but through our experience. The latter is the body as observed and scientifically investigated. It is the body that is known to others. These are bodies that people see, admire, imitate, criticize, or even dissect. For phenomenological philosophers, to be a subject (a self) essentially requires a body. Consciousness cannot simply be immaterial but must be embodied. The "I think" implies "I can,” in the sense that "I can” go somewhere else as a being possessing a body. This is where Merleau-Ponty opposed the dualist account of subjectivity. Mind and body are essentially correlated and it is not possible to understand subjectivity without taking into account this essential correlation. He also opposed the Cartesian cogito. For him, consciousness is both perceiving and engaging. To sum it up, Merleau-Ponty's, "I am my body" cannot simply be interpreted as advocating a materialist, behaviorist type position. He accepts the idea of mental states but he also suggests that the use of the mind is inseparable from our bodily, situated, physical nature. The body cannot be viewed solely as an object, or material entity of the world. 15 After reading all the philosophical perspectives on the self, make your own philosophy of the self incorporating the ideas you learned from the different philosophers. MY PHILOSOPHY OF THE SELF ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ 16 Multiple Choice: Choose the letter of the correct answer. Write your answers before the number of the test item. _____1. He is regarded as the Father of Modern Philosophy. A. Gilbert Ryle B. Rene Descartes C. John Locke D. Immanuel Kant _____2. He postulates that the human mind at birth is a blank slate or tabula rasa. A. David Hume B. Immanuel Kant C. Gilbert Ryle D. John Locke _____3. According to Plato, the ______ soul seeks truth and is swayed by facts and arguments. A. spirited B. rational C. vegetative D. appetitive _____4. What main categories did Hume use to describe mental perceptions? A. impressions and ideas B. the physical and the spiritual C. ideas and memories D. sensations and perceptions _____5. The first philosopher to engage in systematic questioning about the self. A. Aristotle B. Socrates C. Plato D. St. Augustine Alata, Eden Joy, Caslib, Bernardo Jr., Serafica, Janice Patria & Pawilen, R.A. 2018. Understanding The Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: Rex Book Store, 1st ed. Brawner, D. and Arcega, A. 2018. Understanding the Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: C & E Publishing, Inc. Corpuz M. Ronald, Estoque S. Ronan, & Tabotabo, Claudio V. 2019. Understanding the Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: C & E Publishing, Inc. 1st Ed. https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-psychology/chapter/psychodynamic- perspectives-on-personality/ 17 UNIT I: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES Lesson 2: Psychology 1.5 weeks or 4.5 hours How do you define who you are? Do you rely on the different roles and relationships you have, such as being a mother, a teacher, a soldier, or a son? Or, would you say your identity is more based on your thoughts, emotions, and knowledge of the world around you? Some people believe it is neither of those, and that the sense of self is your self-esteem. Do you like what you see when you look in the mirror? What do you think you're capable of accomplishing? All of these questions pertain to the idea of the sense of self. In psychology, the sense of self is defined as the way a person thinks about and views his or her traits, beliefs, and purpose within the world. It refers to a person’s experience as a single, unitary, autonomous being that is separate from others, experienced with continuity through time and place. The experience of the self starts when one identifies himself or herself as an object, followed by describing oneself as a self-concept or self-feeling, and ends with saying that the self is manifested in how one acts and presents himself or herself to others.(Zhao, 2014). In this process, the self is perceives through how one sees and understands himself or herself. At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. identify oneself based on William James Theory of Self; 2. differentiate one’s real self and ideal self; and 3. value the importance of alignment of oneself. 18 Real Self vs. Ideal Self On the left column list down descriptions of your real self (Who you actually are?) and on the right descriptions of your ideal self (Who do you want to be?). Real Self (Who you actually are) Ideal Self (Who do you want to be?) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. Processing Questions 1. How did you feel when you were trying to identify words that describe your real self? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 2. Was it difficult or easy to look for words to describe your real self? Why or why not? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 3. How did you feel when you were asked to identify your ideal self? ___________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ 4. Was it difficult or easy to think of words to describe your ideal self? Why or why not? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 19 The Self as Cognitive Construct How people define themselves in relation to others greatly influences how they think, feel, and behave, and is ultimately related to the construct of identity. Self- development is a continuous process throughout the lifespan; one’s sense of self may change, at least somewhat, throughout one’s life. Self-representation has important implications for socio-emotional functioning throughout the lifespan. William James Theory of Self Philosopher and psychologist William James (1842–1910) was one of the first to postulate a theory of the self in The Principles of Psychology. James described two aspects or categories of the self that he termed the “I” Self and “Me” Self. For James, a human being has the capacity to be a thinking subject and the object of his or her thinking at the same time. As a thinking subject, an individual is both conscious of his or her environment and conscious of his or her existence. The continuous stream of consciousness internal to an individual constitutes the “I” Self which is responsible for the thinking and makes awareness and self-awareness possible. An individual turns himself or herself into a “Me” Self when he or she makes himself or herself the object of his or her own thinking. James claims that in understanding the self, the self can be contextualized in three categories: the constituents of the self; the feelings and emotions they arouse (self-feelings): and the actions they prompt (self-seeking).  Constituents of the self refer to the further sub-categories of the self including the material self, social self, and spiritual self. Note: These concepts were further discussed below.  The second category of the self refers to the feelings and emotions aroused in the individual because of his or her knowledge and appraisal of his or her empirical existence in the world.  The third category refers to the actions the self prompts- the effort of every individual to preserve and improve oneself based on one's self-knowledge and resulting self-feelings. Simply put, the self is an object to be reflected upon, an object that is capable of arousing emotions and prompting actions. 20 According to James, these sub-categories are related in a hierarchical way, with material self at the bottom, the spiritual self at the top, and the social self in between. Together, they constitute what James calls the empirical self (Zhao, 2014 James further distinguished three components of the Me Self. These include: (1) the material self (e.g., tangible objects or possessions we collect for ourselves); (2) the social self (e.g., how we interact and portray ourselves within different groups, situations, or persons); and (3) the spiritual self (e.g., internal dispositions). 1. The Material Self. Consists of things that belong to us or that we belong to. Things like family, clothes, our body, and money are some of what makes up our material selves. It refers to tangible objects, people, or places that carry the designation my or mine.  Two subclasses of the material self can be distinguished: The bodily self and the extracorporeal (beyond the body) self. Rosenberg (1979) has referred to the extracorporeal self as the extended self.  The bodily component of the material self requires little explanation. A person speaks of my arms or my legs. These entities are clearly an intimate part of who we are.  But our sense of self is not limited to our bodies. It includes other people (my children), pets (my dog), possessions (my car), places (my home town), and the products of our labors (my painting) called extended self.  It is not the physical entities themselves, however, that comprise the material self. Rather, it is our psychological ownership of them (Scheibe, 1985). For example, a person may have a favorite chair she likes to sit in. The chair itself is not part of the self. Instead, it is the sense of appropriation represented by the phrase “my favorite chair.” This is what we mean when we talk about the extended self. It includes all of the people, places, and things that we regard as “ours.” 2. The Social Self. It refers to how we are regarded and recognized by others.  Our social selves are who we are in a given social situation. For James, people change how they act depending on the social situation that they are in. James believed that people had as many social selves as they did social situations they participated in. 3. The Spiritual Self. For James, the spiritual self was who we are at our core. The spiritual self is more concrete or permanent than the other two selves. The spiritual self is our subjective and most intimate self. Aspects of an individual's spiritual self include things like their personality, core values, and conscience that do not typically change throughout their lifetime. 21  The spiritual self is our inner self or our psychological self. It is comprised of our self-perceived abilities, attitudes, emotions, interests, values, motives, opinions, traits, and wishes. Carl Rogers's Self Theory Carl Rogers' believed that the self does not exist at birth; it is developed gradually during childhood wherein one differentiates the self from non-self. He proposed that by means of free choice and action, one can shape himself or herself based on what he or she wants to be. Rogers considered the self as the center of experience. According to him, the self is one's ongoing sense of who and what he or she is and how and why he or she responds to the environment. The choices an individual makes are based on his or her set of values. Roger's theory focuses on the nature of the self and the conditions that allow the self to freely develop (Rathus, 2014). Real Self vs. Ideal Self The real self is who an individual actually is, intrinsically. It is the self that feels closest to how one identifies with. It is how one thinks, feels, looks, and acts. It is the self that feels most natural, comfortable, and true to what and who one really is. It is the self that one continuously needs to accept, takes care of, and improves. Despite the difficulty of an individual to truly know how others see him or her, his or her real self can still be possibly seen. One's significant other may tell almost exactly his or her real self. The real self is one's self-image. The ideal self, on the other hand, is the perception of what a person would like to be or thinks he or she would be. It is an idealized image that has developed over time based on the influence of the environment and the people one interacts with. It is the self that one thinks he or she should be, and that one feels others think he or she should be. This self is a product of expectations and pressures from other people, and arises from the need to be loved and accepted by others. It is dynamic and forever changing. For example, your parents are medical doctors who are respected and admired in the community, and experience tells you that in order to be happy, you need to be smart and have a high-paying job. Your Ideal Self might be someone who excels in science subjects, spends a lot of time studying, and does not get queasy at the sight of blood. If your Real Self is far from this idealized image, then you might feel dissatisfied with your life and consider yourself a failure. Carl Rogers believed that we all own a real self and an ideal self. The real self of course is what we are intrinsically. It’s the self that feels most true to what and who we really are; the honest self that leaves us most comfortable in our skin. It may not be perfect, but it`s the part of us that feels most real. And it`s the one we need to learn to love the most. The ideal self on the other hand, is the self that we think we want to be, 22 that we strive to be, and that we feel we are expected to be. This self is borne out of influences outside of us. It is the self that holds values absorbed from others; a culmination of all those things that we think we should be, and that we feel others think we should be. We want to accommodate those expectations because we believe we will be more loved and accepted if we do. Holding the values of others is not a conscious decision, but rather, a process of osmosis. For the most part, we are not even aware of it. Importance of Alignment Sadly, having an overly strong ideal self can be detrimental to our mental health. It is healthy to some extent to have what we envision as an ideal self. It is something I am a self-actualize person! that we all strive for; to be the best that we can be. Who doesn’t want that? The problem arises when our ideal selves are too far removed from what we really are. When there is a huge discrepancy between what we actually are (real self), and what we want to be (ideal self), we begin to experience an incongruence, a dissonance, a lack of resonance within our true selves, and a gap, sometimes huge, between what we sense as our real self compared to what we feel compelled to aspire to (our ideal self). When the discrepancy between the real self and ideal self is huge, the resulting incongruence can lead us to become demoralized and discouraged because we have in fact set ourselves up for failure. This discrepancy can lead to stress and anxiety because the real self never seems good enough and the ideal self seems impossible to attain. Hence, one should strive to reduce the discrepancy by either addressing the issue or accepting the issue if it cannot be resolved. As much as possible, there has to be an alignment or congruence between the two selves, which happens when the ideal self is closer to the real self. People with align or congruent selves feel a sense of mental well-being or peace of mind. They are more likely to attain self actualization compared to those with incongruent selves. Self-worth is high when the real self and ideal self are close to each other. 23 In the activity part, you identified your real self and ideal self. Reflect and answer the questions as honestly as possible. 1. Are your real and ideal self closely aligned? Why or why not? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 2. How can you make you real and ideal self closely aligned? What steps are you going to do to attain alignment? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ Multiple Choice: Choose the letter of the correct answer. Write your answers before the number of the test item. _____1. According to William James, it is classified as the thinking self or it refers to individuals’ reflections about themselves. A. “I” self B. “We” self C. “Us” self D. “Me” self _____2. It is the self we aspire to be or who we want to be. A. ideal self B. actual self C. real self D. true self _____3. Which of William James’ three components of the self is based on all the physical elements that reflect who you are? A. material self B. social self C. spiritual self D. political self _____4. John is an introvert and a pessimist. He hopes to become an optimist and a more sociable person someday. This happy and positive person that John wants to become is his image of the: A. real self B. ideal self C. self-image D. false self 24 _____5. A subclass of material self that represents our psychological ownership. A. bodily self B. political self C. extended self D. social self Alata, Eden Joy, Caslib, Bernardo Jr., Serafica, Janice Patria & Pawilen, R.A. 2018. Understanding The Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: Rex Book Store, 1st ed. Brawner, D. and Arcega, A. 2018. Understanding the Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: C & E Publishing, Inc. Corpuz M. Ronald, Estoque S. Ronan, & Tabotabo, Claudio V. 2019. Understanding the Self. 1st Ed. Manila, Philippines: C & E Publishing, Inc. 1st Ed. Macayan, J.V. et al (2019). Understanding the Self (Outcome-Based Module). Quezon City: C & E Publishing, Inc.: https://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Ideal+Self https://www.encyclopedia.com/medicine/psychology/psychology-and-psychiatry/self- representation https://listentomethunder.wordpress.com/2012/03/31/the-real-vs-the-ideal-self/ 25 UNIT I: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES Lesson 3: Sociology 1 week or 3 hours In the realm of sociology, the self interacts with the social world. Initially, the self is self-absorbed and is just concerned with its own. Progressively, however, the self expands and is now concerned with other constellations of selves, known as others. Conceptually, with the introduction of others, sociology as a science comes to fore, expanding the self in its contemporary setting and relating with other selves as well. No one could live by himself or herself alone. By extension, man will always look for someone to commune with. The human person is a social animal; he or she will always seek others for commercial or personal reasons. These reasons will always be equated with relationships. Relationships and their scientific study will always be correlated with sociology. In sociology, the self is a product of modern society versus other constructs or archetypes. When one talks about sociology, one talks about social norms and social values. Social factors such as political system, children, partners, school, location, education, economic status, physical status, religion, wealth, family, and ethnicity are also considered. 26 At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. describe and discuss the different ways by which society shape the self; 2. examine oneself in relation to the sociological perspective; and 3. identify how the self is influenced by the different institutions in the society. Collage Making Cut out pictures showing the influences of the different social institutions in the shaping of one’s self and paste in the box. Answer the following questions: 27 1. How do you feel and think as you make your collage? _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ 2. Explain the social influences by different social institutions that you have identified in your collage. _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ The Self as a Product of Society Sociological perspective of the self is based on the assumption that human behavior is influenced by group life. A particular view of oneself is formed through interactions with other people, groups, or social institutions. This lesson draws on the principles and concepts of well-known sociologists to foster student understanding of sociology and how sociology impacts students' everyday lives, and provide a pathway to self-understanding of "who you are" and "what you are" in contemporary society. For sociologist like Mead the self does not depend on biological predispositions; rather, it is a product of social interaction. The sense of self emerges as the individual partakes in the society. George Mead's Social Self Sociologist George Herbert Mead argued that the self is not biological but social. Self is something that is developed through social interaction. The self is developed as one grows and ages. He illustrated the development of self in the case of Genie, a girl who was confined in a room until she reached the age of 13. She was found when she was already 13 years old; she did not know how to walk and speak. According to Mead, she had no development of the self. Even though her body developed normally according to her age, she had not developed her "self" because of her isolation from the world. Self, therefore, is constructed by directly engaging in the world through interaction and through reflections on those interactions. 28 Roles, the Self, and the Generalized Other One of the most noteworthy features of Mead's account of the significant symbol is that it assumes that anticipatory experiences are fundamental to the development of language. We have the ability place ourselves in the positions of others—that is, to anticipate their responses—with regard to our linguistic gestures. This ability is also crucial for the development of the self and self- consciousness. For Mead, as for Hegel, the self is fundamentally social and cognitive. It should be distinguished from the individual, who also has non-cognitive attributes. The self, then, is not identical to the individual and is linked to self-consciousness. It begins to develop when individuals interact with others and play roles. What are roles? They are constellations of behaviors that are responses to sets of behaviors of other human beings. The notions of role-taking and role playing are familiar from sociological and social- psychological literature. For example, the child plays at being a doctor by having another child play at being a patient. To play at being a doctor, however, requires being able to anticipate what a patient might say, and vice versa. Role playing involves taking the attitudes or perspectives of others. It is worth noting in this context that while Mead studied physiological psychology, his work on role-taking can be viewed as combining features of the work of the Scottish sympathy theorists (which James appealed to in The Principles of Psychology), with Hegel's dialectic of self and other. As we will discover shortly, perspective-taking is associated not only with roles, but with far more complex behaviors. For Mead, if we were simply to take the roles of others, we would never develop selves or self-consciousness. We would have a nascent form of self-consciousness that parallels the sort of reflexive awareness that is required for the use of significant symbols. A role-taking (self) consciousness of this sort makes possible what might be called a proto- self, but not a self, because it doesn't have the complexity necessary to give rise to a self. How then does a self arise? Here Mead introduces his well-known neologism, the generalized other. When children or adults take roles, they can be said to be playing these roles in dyads. However, this sort of exchange is quite different from the more complex sets of behaviors that are required to participate in games. In the latter, we are required to learn not only the responses of specific others, but behaviors associated with every position on the field. These can be internalized, and when we succeed in doing so we come to “view” our own behaviors from the perspective of the game as a whole, which is a system of organized actions. 29 The organized community or social group which gives to the individual his unity of self may be called “the generalized other.” The attitude of the generalized other is the attitude of the whole community. Thus, for example, in the case of such a social group as a ball team, the team is the generalized other in so far as it enters—as an organized process or social activity—into the experience of any one of the individual members of it. (MSS, 154) For Mead, although these communities can take different forms, they should be thought of as systems; for example, a family can be thought of systemically and can therefore give rise to a generalized other and a self that corresponds to it. Generalized others can also be found in concrete social classes or subgroups, such as political parties, clubs, corporations, which are all actually functional social units, in terms of which their individual members are directly related to one another. The others are abstract social classes or subgroups, such as the class of debtors and the class of creditors, in terms of which their individual members are related to one another only more or less indirectly. (MSS, 157) For Mead, self is not inborn. Babies cannot interpret the meaning of other people's behavior. It is usually learned during childhood which comes in three stages of development. First is the preparatory stage (0-3 years old). Children imitate the people around them, especially family members with whom they have daily interaction. Example, a child imitates the behavior of his or her parents like sweeping the floor. But they copy behavior without understanding underlying intentions, and so at this stage, they have no sense of self. During this stage, children are just preparing for role-taking. Second is the play stage (3 to 5 years old). During the play stage, children start to view themselves in relation to others as they learn to communicate through language and other symbols. At this stage, role-taking is exhibited; however, children do not perceive role-taking as something expected of them. The self emerges as children pretend to take the roles of specific people or significant others, those individuals who are important agents of socialization. At this stage, the self is developing. Play stage involves the child playing the role of others. For example, the child may act as a teacher, carpenter, or soldier. In doing these, he or she becomes aware that there is a difference between himself or herself and the role that he or she is playing. However, children do not perceive role-playing as something expected of them. (Corpuz,2019) Last is the game stage (begins in the early school years; about 8 or 9 years old). Children understand not only their own social position but also those of others around them. They come to see himself or herself from the perspective of other people. To play the game, the child must be aware of his or her relationship to other people and place himself or herself in their roles in order to appreciate his or her particular role in the game. In doing this, he or she sees himself or herself in terms of the collective viewpoint of other people and the attitude of generalized others. They become concerned about and take into account in their behavior the generalized others which refer to the attitudes, viewpoints, demands, and expectations of the society which include cultural norms and values that serve as references in evaluating oneself. This is the time when remarks like "He is brilliant," "She is creative," or "He is lazy" are formed. They can have a more sophisticated look of people and an ability to respond to numerous members of the social environment. During this stage, the self is now present. 30 "I" and "Me" Self For Mead, all humans experience internal conversation. This conversation involves the “I” and “me”, which he called phases of self. For him, self is essentially a social process going on between the “I” and “me”. The “I” is the phase of the self that is unsocialized and spontaneous. It is the acting part of the self, an immediate response to other people. It represents the self that is free and unique. It is the subjective part of the self. The “Me”, on the contrary, is the self that results from the progressive stages of role playing or role- taking and the perspective one assumes to view and analyze one's own behaviors. It is the organization of the internalized attitude of others. It represents the conventional and objective part of the self. The “I” is the response of the organism to the attitude of others. The 'I' represents the individual's identity based on response to the 'me‘, or the person’s individuality. It allows the individual to still express creativity and individualism and understand when to possibly bend and stretch the rules that govern social interactions. The 'I', therefore, can be considered the present and future phase of the self. The “Me” is the organized set of attitudes of others which one assumes. It is the socialized aspect of the individual. It represents learned behaviors, attitudes, and expectations of others and society. It is developed through the knowledge of society and social interactions that the individual has experienced. A phase of the self that is in the past. The full development of the self is attained when the "I" and the "me" are united. The Socialization Process Humans learn the expectations of society through socialization. Socialization is different based on race, gender and class. Agents of Socialization  The Family Families introduce children to the expectations of society. Socialization is different based on race, gender and class. Human persons learn the ways of living and therefore their selfhood by being in a family. It is what a family initiates a person to become that serves as the basis for this person’s progress. Babies internalized ways and styles that they observe from their family. Internalizing behavior may either be conscious or unconscious. Table manners or ways of speaking to elders are things that are possible to teach and therefore, are consciously learned by kids. One is who he is because of his family for the most part.  The Media The average young person (age 8–19) spends 6 3/4 hours per day immersed in media in various forms, often using multiple media forms simultaneously. Television is the dominant medium, although half of all youth use a computer daily. Can you notice how children eventually become what they watch? How children can easily adapt ways of cartoon characters they are exposed to.  Peers 31 For children, peer culture is an important source of identity. Through interaction with peers, children learn concepts of self, gain social skills, and form values and attitudes.  Religion Children tend to develop the same religious beliefs as their parents. Very often those who disavow religion return to their original faith at some point in their life, especially if they have strong ties to their family of origin and after they form families of their own.  Schools In school, teachers and other students are the source of expectations that encourage children to think and behave in particular ways. Research finds that teachers respond differently to boys than to girls, with boys receiving more of their attention. Determining Appropriate Social Behavior Describe how you are expected to behave and interact with other people in each of these situations. You may consider the following factors: volume of your voice, dress code, general behavior. 1. Attending church services ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 2. Studying in the library ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 3. Attending a class ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 4. Meeting a new friend ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 5. Attending a formal party with parents ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ Multiple Choice: Choose the letter of the correct answer. Write your answers before the number of the test item. _____1. The organized community or social group which gives to the individual his unity of self. A. significant others B. generalized others 32 C. society D. looking glass self _____2. He proposed the theory of social self. A. Carl Rogers B. William James C. George Herbert Mead D. Charles Horton Cooley _____3. During this stage, the self emerges as children pretend to take the roles of specific people or significant others A. game stage B. preparatory stage C. imitation age D. play stage _____4. It is considered the socialized aspect of the individual and represents learned behaviors, attitudes, and expectations of others and of society. A. “ME” self B. “I” self C. “WE” self D. “US” self _____5. During this stage, there is no sense of self. A. play B. game C. preparatory D. role-taking Alata, E.J.P. et al (2018). Understanding the Self. : Quezon City: Rex Bookstore Inc. Corpuz, R.M. et al (2019). Understanding the Self. Quezon City: C & E Publishing, Inc. Macayan, J.V. et al (2019). Understanding the Self (Outcome-Based Module). Quezon City: C & E Publishing, Inc.: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mead/ 33 UNIT I: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES Lesson 4: Anthropology 1 week or 3 hours The Self Embedded in Culture How we see ourselves shapes our lives, and is shaped by our cultural context. Self- perceptions influence how we think about the world, our social relationships, health and lifestyles choices, and another people’s well-being. Culture has such a great influence on our lives and is contributing greatly to our self-concept. The influence might either be negative or positive depending on the type of culture we have been brought up in. Culture contributes a great deal in shaping our individual personality or the SELF. At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. explore the self from the perspectives of Anthropology; 2. examine the cultural influences in shaping one’s self; and 3. analyze how these influences are manifested in real life situations. 34 Let’s explore..... How much do you know? List down as many cultural practices as you know from different regions of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. Cultural Practices from different Regions of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao Luzon Visayas Mindanao Based on your lists, answer the following questions: 1. What are the similarities among the regional practices? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 2. What are its uniqueness in each region? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 3. Which cultural practices can you best relate with? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 4. What significant learnings can you get from the cultural practices? ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ 35 Cultural Anthropology is the study of human culture and society. It is the study of people – their origin, their development, and contemporary variations, wherever and whenever those have been found (Ferraro, 2008). Culture on the other hand refers to the major way in which human beings adapt to their environment and give meaning to their lives. It includes human behavior and ideas that are learned rather than genetically transmitted, as well as the material objects produced by a group of people (Nanda and Warren, 2007). How we see ourselves shapes our lives, and is shaped by our cultural context. Self- perceptions influence how we think about the world, our social relationships, health and lifestyles choices, and another people’s well-being. Culture has such a great influence on our lives and is contributing greatly to our self-concept. The influence might either be negative or positive depending on the type of culture we have been brought up in. Culture contributes a great deal in shaping our individual personality or the SELF. The impact of culture on the self is based on our cultural beliefs and values. It also depends on the kind of education we receive or the kind of culture we are growing up into. It is sometimes argued that the concepts of the self, the person, or the individual are culturally variable because people are not always considered to be persons everywhere. Culture is something shared that characterize a group collectively just like identity. The Origins of Self explores the role that selfhood plays in defining human society, and each human individual in that society. It considers the genetic and cultural origins of self, the role that self plays in socialization and language, and the types of self we generate in our individual journeys to and through adulthood. Anthropology - has explored various meanings of culture, self and identity to better understand the self. - holds a holistic view of human nature. It is considered with how cultural and biological processes interact to shape the self. Who am I? What could be the answer to this question? Anthropology considers human experience as an interplay of “nature” referring to genetic inheritance which sets the individual’s potentials. - meaning to all of the genes and hereditary factors that influence who we are – from our physical appearance to our personality characteristics “nurture” referring to the sociocultural environment - meaning to all the environmental variations that impact who we are, including our early childhood experiences, how we were raised, our social relationship, and our surrounding culture. Anthropology is providing insights into the nature of self-based on continuous understanding of the basic element of culture 36 The Self as Embedded in Culture Cultural Differences exist when groups of people assign different meanings to different life events and things. Therefore, the self is embedded/ attached in culture American Anthropologist Clifford Geertz in “The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man” states that “... culture provides the link between what men are intrinsically capable of becoming and what they actually, one by one, in fact become.” This lead us to the importance of culture in understanding who we are as human beings.  Culture – is a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which people communicate, perpetuate and develop their knowledge about and attitudes toward life.  Man acquires his knowledge, beliefs, morals, customs, and other habits and capacities from his interactions with others in the society where he belongs.  We learn our cultural practices and traditions by listening, talking, and interacting with other people.  As a child we learn appropriate behavior by observing and copying the behavior of adults.  We express our feelings and make judgement of what is right or what is wrong based on our interpretation of adults behavior.  This serves to guide our own behavior and perceptions throughout life.  Thus, our shared beliefs, values, memories, and expectations bind us together who grow up in the same culture. 37 Make a reflection paper using the guide questions below. 1. How do you feel about the pictures that was presented above? 2. What is its main message to you? Support you answer. _______________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________ 38 Alata, E. J., Caslib, B. Jr., Serafica, J. P. & Pawilen, R.A. (2018). Understanding the self (1st ed.). Manila: Rex Book Store. Aligada, G. & Trajeco, S. (2010). Introduction to sociology and anthropology: Text and workbook. Quezon City: AMMS Publications. Ariola, Mariano (2012). Sociology and anthropology with family planning. Intramuros, Manila: Purely Book Trading and Publishing Corp. Atienza, M.E., Rico, R., Arugay, A., Franco, J. & Quilala, D. (2016). Understanding culture, society and politics. Quezon City: C & E Publishing, Inc. Brawner, D. & Arcega, A. (2018). Understanding the self. Quezon City: C & E Publishing, Inc. https://theculturetrip.com/asia/phillipines/ https://prezi.com/go6zixmolgw-/an-anthropological-conceptualization-of-self/ 39 UNIT I: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES Lesson 5: The Self in Western & Oriental/Eastern Thought 1 week or 3 hours Different cultures and varying environment tends to create different perceptions of the “self” and one of the most common distinctions between cultures and people is the eastern vs. western dichotomy wherein eastern represents Asia and western represents Europe and Northern America. Oftentimes we associate western thought with individualism and eastern/oriental with collectivism. In this lesson we learn more of their differences in terms of culture, values, norms, and practices. At the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. examine the cultural influences in shaping one’s self; 2. analyze how these influences are manifested in real life situation; 3. discuss personality differences of people from collectivist and individualist cultures; 4. differentiate the concept of self according to Western thought against Eastern/Oriental perspective. 40 Let’s read this..... Sherpa village is found at the mountains around Mt. Everest in Nepal. Six (6) Sherpa children were observed on how they were able to learn to speak their own Sherpa language and culture. Here are the findings.... When Sherpa adults talk to children, they used commands at astronomical rates. Sometimes, there were over 200 commands per hour. Often these commands came when the child was already coming, washing, or eating. Then, when a 4 year old talked to a 2 year old child, there was the same proportion of commands. What these commands, were really being used for was to mark status, which is based on age in Sherpa society. These children were learning language.... but right from the start they’re also learning the cultural patterns and expectations that go along with the language use. Language and culture comes together. The language they’re learning is full of information about their culture and some of the most important parts of the culture are about how language should be used. The better we understand how language is learned across culture, the better we can interact with people from different backgrounds. (“Language Development and Socialization in Sherpa” Ciesielski, Sara U. retrieved at https://www.phdcomics.com/tv) Ways of greetings in different countries. Greetings around the world differ radically from culture to culture and sometimes they are shaped by religion or superstitious beliefs. Study the pictures and identify what country they represent. Choose your answers below and write it on the space provided below the pictures. a. Russia c. Japan e. Argentina b. Philippines d. New Zealand f. Nigeria ________________________ ________________________ 41 __________________________ _________________________ ________________________ _______________________ Based on where you live, do you agree or disagree with the traits associated with yourself and the residents of your area of the country? Why or why not? _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________ 42 Personality is shaped by both genetic and environmental factors. The culture in which you live is one of the most important environmental factors that shapes your personality. The term culture refers to all of the beliefs, customs, art, and traditions of a particular society. Culture is transmitted to people through language as well as through the modelling of culturally acceptable and non-acceptable behaviors that are either rewarded or punished. Different cultures and varying environment tends to create different perceptions of the “self” and one of the most common distinctions between cultures and people is the eastern vs. western dichotomy wherein eastern represents Asia and western represents Europe and Northern America. Oftentimes we associate western thought with individualism and eastern/oriental with collectivism. Individualist cultures and collectivist cultures place emphasis on different basic values. People who live in individualist cultures tend to believe that independence, competition, and personal achievement are important. People who live in collectivist cultures value social harmony, respectfulness, and group needs over individual needs. These values influence personality. For example, people in individualist cultures displayed more personally oriented personality traits, whereas people in collectivist cultures displayed more socially oriented personality traits. The Western Culture is what we would call an individualistic culture since their focus is on the person. Asian culture, on the other hand, is called a collectivistic culture as the group and social relations that is given more importance than individual needs and wants. Individualism vs. Collectivism Individualism Collectivism Individualist culture is a culture in Collectivist culture is a culture in which the goals of the individual which the goals of the group take take precedence over the goals of precedence over the goals of the the group. individual. 43 It means that, members are responsible It means that members are responsible for for themselves and, perhaps, their the group as a whole. immediate families. Success is measured by how far one Success is measured by one’s contributions stands out from the crowd. to the group as a whole. Ex: self-made millionaires, Ex: loyalty to company or country, employees of the month, standing specialized skills, fitting in… out… The “I” identity. The “We” identity. The individual identifies primarily Collectivist views the group as the with self, with the needs of the primary entity, with the individuals individual being satisfied before lost along the way. those of the group. The survival and success of the The individual is acts and makes his group ensures the well-being of the own choices, looks after and taking individual, so that by considering care of oneself and being self- the needs and feelings of others, sufficient. one protects oneself. Independence and self-reliance are Harmony and the interdependence greatly stressed and valued. of group members are stressed and In general, they tend to distance valued. themselves psychologically and It sees the group as the important emotionally from each other. One element, and individuals are just may choose to join groups, but members of the group. The group group membership is not essential has its own values somehow to one’s identity or success. different from those of the Individualistic doers are self- individual members. assured and very independent Each person is encouraged to be people. They are quiet and realistic, an active player in society, to do very rational, extremely matter of what is best for society as a whole fact people. They strongly cultivate rather than themselves. their individualism and enjoy Rules promote unity, brotherhood, applying their abilities to new tasks. and selflessness. But they are also very spontaneous Working with others and and impulsive persons who like to cooperating is the norm; everyone follow their sudden inspirations. supports each other. Individualistic people are  collectivist people can have a susceptible to loneliness strong fear of rejection. Individualism:  Collectivism: Individual autonomy; self-oriented;

Unit I: The Self From Various Perspectives - Lesson 1: Philosophy PDF

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