- Define socialisation
- Identify agents of socialisation
- Explain primary vs secondary socialisation
Socialisation
Feral children — raised without human contact — struggle to learn language or social behaviour later. We become human by being socialised.
Socialisation is the lifelong process by which we learn our society’s norms, values and roles — becoming functioning members. Primary socialisation (family, early childhood) lays the foundations; secondary socialisation (school, peers, media, work) builds on it.
Key points
- Family: first and deepest — language, basic values, class position.
- School: the hidden curriculum — punctuality, obedience, competition — alongside the formal one.
- Peers and media: powerful in adolescence; shape identity, tastes, slang.
- It never stops: new jobs, parenthood, migration all re-socialise us.
Schools officially teach maths; unofficially they teach sitting still, raising hands, accepting authority and ranking — lessons about how institutions work.
Practice
Primary: early childhood, mainly family — basic norms, language, identity. Secondary: later agents like school and peers — building on those foundations.
Punctuality, deference to authority, competition for grades — institutional habits learned alongside subjects.
- Socialisation makes us members of society — it’s learned, not innate.
- Family, school, peers and media are key agents.
- The hidden curriculum teaches institutional behaviour.
- Socialisation continues across the whole life course.