Strauss Claudia, Quinn Naomi. A Cognitive Theory of Cultural Meaning

Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1998. — 336 p. — ISBN10: 052159541X; ISBN13: 978-0521595414 — (Publications of the Society for Psychological Anthropology. Book 9)"Culture" and "meaning" are central to anthropology, but anthropologists do not agree on what they are. Claudia Strauss and Naomi Quinn propose a new theory of cultural meaning, one that gives priority to the way people's experiences are internalized. Drawing on "connectionist" or "neural network" models as well as other psychological theories, they argue that cultural meanings are not fixed or limited to static groups, but neither are they constantly revised or contested. Their approach is illustrated by original research on understandings of marriage and ideas of success in the United States.BackgroundMeanings and culture
Psychology and cultural anthropology
Summary of the bookAnthropological resistanceInterpretivism: meanings are public
Poststructuralism and postmodernism: culture and the self are constructed
Historical materialism: people can resist cultural meanings
Cognition in practice/discourse pragmatics: meanings depend on context
Toward a more fruitful resolution: BourdieuSchema theory and connectionismIntroduction to connectionism
Connectionism for the somewhat more formally minded
Final comments: symbols and meaningsImplications for a theory of cultureTwo properties of cultureDurability in the individual
Motivational forceThree further properties of cultureHistorical durability
Thematicity
SharednessPractice and possibilitiesResearch on shared task solutionsMetaphors for marriage and what they do
A shared schema for reasoning about marriageResearch on the psychodynamics of shared understandingsThe psychodynamic basis of marital loveResearch on cultural discontinuitiesHow are conflicting discourses internalized?
The disparate motivational effects of different forms of culture learning
Disjunctures between shared understandings and public cultureBeyond old oppositionsNotesGeneral index
Name index