The people of Pakistan speak a variety of languages. Our forefathers spoke these languages too. They taught them to their children, who in turn, taught them to those who would live after them, and so on. Finally our parents and grandparents passed them on to us. The same is the case with our festivals, cuisine, clothing and other elements of culture. Culture is always something that is learned and passed down from generation to generation. The process of acquiring culture is known as socialisation.
In Sociology, the concept of socialization is critical. But, “What is socialization?” The authors of one text book define socialization as “a learning process, one that involves development or changes in the individual’s sense of self”, and this is exactly true. Socialization is a learning process. When your parents teach you how to use a toilet or behave politely, when your teachers teach you about your country’s history, when a priest teaches you to behave a certain way (i.e. listen to God’s commandments), you are being socialized. When you are being socialized, you are taking part (willingly or unwillingly) in a learning process.
Now, this definition is fine as far as it goes; unfortunately though, it does not really capture the full importance and significance of socialization, nor does it cover the broad sense of the meaning. Yes, socialization is a learning process and yes we develop a “sense of self” as we are socialized, but socialization is much more than that. If socialization was just a learning process, we could call it education and be done with it. If socialization was only about our “sense of self” we could leave with psychologists and not be bothered ourselves. But socialization is more than just education and it impacts more than just your sense of self. The socialization process you go through is significant and sophisticated and any definition of it should capture that significance.
In order to understand the significance of the socialization process, the first thing you have to understand is that socialization is not a political, socially, or even spiritually neutral process. That is, the things you are a taught and the ways you are to behave are not random. When you are born and the socialization process begins, it is not just about you and your family, it is about the social and political order within which you are born into. In other words, socialization teaches you the social order. And note, it is not voluntary. When the socialization process begins, you don’t have a choice. Whatever society you are born into, whatever the sex of the body you happen to inhabit, you are given no choice about what you will learn. Immediately after you are born, and long before you have the intellectual capacity to understand what it is that is happening to you, the process of imposing the social order begins.