Is Human Nature A Social Construct?

[Nameless14]

I would appreciate it if you would explain your understanding on where the boundaries of this "everything is a social construct" dictum ends and begins. Thank you!

[woofgang]

no freaking idea.....what do you think?

[Canary42]

I don't really understand it, but surely the "everything" implies no end - as for the beginning, who knows ?

[1ozzy]

No!

Human nature started way before the concept of "society".

So how could human nature be a "social construct"?

[kvalidir]

Everything is a social construct but that happens in all cultures, even cultures of two. As soon as someone else's wishes are considered people are expected to amend their behaviour to accommodate that and not act according to their on true wishes, so we get all sorts of artificially created emotions and scenarios because of it.

[1ozzy]

Mankind may feel a need to be accepted, hence "social construct".
Human nature is to be fed, safe and have shelter.

[kvalidir]

That's very true x

[1ozzy]

"You and me baby ain't nothing but mammals
So let's do it like they do on the discovery channel"

;-))

[ToraToraTora]

No, human nature is a biological imperative enforced by instinct. Due to intelligence Individuals may override certain aspects due to societal pressures but the underlying tendency is always there.

[Old_Geezer]

It's an observation.

[Theland]

With a secular materialist worldview, the, "social construct," is like putty, waiting for the next bit of social engineering or theorising to explain it and mold it to the prevailing societal fashion.
I don't understand post modernism, not many do, but I think the post modernists are always coming up with new theories to explain what makes us tick, and how we can tick better.
Personally, I reject any theory that tries to explain us in terms that do not reply on objective moral absolutes.
Subjective relativity is to me a misunderstanding of our true nature.

[Jackdaw33]

Clearly my time at university was completely wasted. I studied modern languages but if I had studied Sociology I would have been able to speak gobbledygook.

[Theland]

Really? I'll teach you.

[vetuste_ennemi]

It's a good question, Nameless, but you need to define its terms precisely.

I think most of the responders have tried to give honest answers to (IMO) a loosely formulated OP.

[Theland]

Look at marriage for example.
Monogamy or polygamy?
Why do we in the west with our Judeo Christian roots opt for the former and not the latter?
Is it because of a moral imperative or just a convenience that benefits us?
And what of polygamists coming into our society?
Should they be frowned upon for non conformity, or because they have crossed the line of a widely held reverence for a moral absolute?

[mibn2cweus]

Hell no. Society is a construct created to subject humanity to the whims of the largest mob wielding the biggest clubs.

[Peter Pedant]

Which course are you doing ? and at what level ?

the answers would vary according to philosophy ( everything perceived is a er perception so that you will have your own internal social constructs based on experience to interpret it in a useful way )

to sociology
altho we know what a criminal trial is - bad fella- conviction-prison is real enough in this world
but a sociologist will assert that a criminal trial
is a 'status degradation ceremony' which is deffo a social construct

take school
building where you were coralled in 5 - 15 and made to learn things like 'etre' = to be
however even in the sixties, Ivan Illich was saying that we need to "de-school society"
oo-er you say - I can see 'social construct' looming here and yes the point he was making was that school trained a person how to behave in society in later life
and hey that sounds like a social construct to me !

so if you are doing this for a course
you need to stick a pencil in your mouth
think of a variety of situations
and see how real they are ( prisons plenty real )
and how they affect behaviour
in which case you are defining the boundaries ....

[ sorry that analysis is based on point set topology but hey all maff is a social construct innit? ]

[Peter Pedant]

yeah I quite like marriage as a social construct

we all know what marriage is ( mwah mwah and all that ) and yet it means different things in different societies -
and hey divorce as a social construct - even better

[Peter Pedant]

yeah foo
what about social constructs which have no basis in reality?

yeah satanic worship ( 1980s) - yeah just didnt exist - nope - rien - nada. real enough in social workers and lwyers minds

OK - what about the Middlesborough child abuse scandal - also late 1980s - child abuse did occur but was vastly overdiagnosed in M, and treated as a disease ( baby doctors got involved well ex-baby doctors they lost their jobs as a result ) and not as a crime/activity

well at the time it was looked on as vast and damaging over diagnosis
By the time that there was an inquiry they thought a third werent, a third could have been and a third were ( abused)

There is a lifetime court injunction forbidding anyone asking the kids now adults what really happened - so I cannot possibly say that it now looks as tho half might have been and a half were.
so that is an example of the real thing being dismissed as a social construct

Oh there is a episode of Rumpole featuring satanic abuse as a non-real thing so the realisation that it was a empty social construct occurred with five years

whereas the baby doctors from M who were fired and humiliated over the event - go around saying "we were right all along and no one listened" and are STILL getting it in the neck from politicians - (their real mistake may have been to medicalise child abuse as a social construct and not to overdiagnose it)

[Peter Pedant]

Long long essay on this

http://bodahlbom.se/1992/06/16/the-idea-that-reality-is-socially-constructed/

[Peter Pedant]

this is quite good:
http://web.mit.edu/~shaslang/www/papers/HaslangerOSC.pdf

gender ( rather than anatomic sex ) as a social construct
or classifying your associates as 'cool' and 'uncool'
card game of bridge is a clear social construct

if Mushie reads any of this
can she give me a ref on
anthropology as a social construct ?

quite a bit on using social construcst as a tool in anthropology