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Transmission of Culture


Schooling, like socialization, requires communication. Amongst human beings this process is an immensely subtle one, which drives its complexity from our ability to symbolize. A symbol is any voluntary act. event or record, which through social usages has cone to stand for something else. The meanings of symbols are arbitrary. They can stand for objects, events, relationships or other symbols (O’Brien at 1964-, P-273). The most important kind of symbols are those that have acquired standard meanings expressed in words throughout a given society or social group.
Language has been defined as a “a structured system of arbitrary vocal symbols by means of which members of a social group interact” (Bram 1955 P-2). Apart form its function as a mediator between man and his “world” languages also extends the possible area of social interaction beyond the possible boundaries set by the ordinary limits of person to person contact. We can respond to the thoughts and feelings of people long dead or on the other side of the world. In a sense, man is not at home today in the once familiar world of ordinary physical events, immediately of his existence has been sacrificed to the artificial and the intricacies of symbolic process (Bram 1955 P-8).