Keywords
Lifeworld—everyday life experience, the things that go without saying and which do not need to be taught, the stuff of identity and subjectivity.
Material differences—differences in access to wealth and social resources, which may be the result of social class or geographical locale.
Social class—a material or economic measure of wealth, power and status in an unequal and hierarchically ordered social structure.
Locale—geographical locations and the resources and opportunities offered by those locations, for instance: different neighbourhoods in a city; rural or remove versus urban location; different regions in a country; being in a developed or developing country.
Corporeal differences—bodily realities such as age, race, sex and sexuality, and physical and mental characteristics.
Age—a determinant of bodily and mental capacities, and the relevant and appropriate forms of social interaction and learning at each age level.
Race—differences in physical appearance, between one human population and another: skin colour, facial features, hair colour and texture, height and physique.
Sex and sexuality—sex is the biologically inherited aspect of male/female difference, and sexuality is constituted by forms of attraction and liaison such as heterosexuality and homosexuality.
Body form—physical and mental attributes that may affect the way one lives one’s life and one’s identity, such a tall or short, ‘fat’ or ‘thin’, ‘disability’ or ability.
Symbolic differences—socially constructed realities of culture, language, gender, family, affinity and persona, based on the human propensity to make meaning and sense of their encounters with the world in creatively varied ways.
Culture—defined narrowly as ethnicity, nationality or ancestry, or broadly as human social-symbolic activity.
Language—the human symbol-making systems of speaking and writing.
Gender—symbolic or cultural attributes ascribed to and associated with sex and sexuality, such as feminine and masculine roles and identities.
Family—relationships of cohabitation and child rearing, such as nuclear, extended and blended families.
Affinity and persona—a person’s associations and the way he or she envisions him or her self, including religion, politics, affinity groups and personality types.
Exclusion—maintaining a group’s sameness by keeping out those who are different.
Assimilation—maintaining a group’s sameness by establishing a condition that people who are different must become ‘normal’ or like the dominant group, to be accepted.
Recognition—when differences are named, people are classified and at least minimal measures are taken to deal with these differences.
Inclusion—a process of making people feel they belong in their difference, and making those differences an integral and productive part of the social activity.