Differentiation levels of cultural mediation within a socio-cultural sphere: a re-evaluation of the concept of culture.

Matusov and Smith (Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science 46: 3, 2012) use a genealogical analysis of the US middle class to show how classic concepts of identity do not only represent historically, politically, and culturally local phenomena, but also contribute to them. Their analysis nicely exemplifies how culture, as semiotic mediation, guides and constrains both societal as well as intra- and inter-personal structures. As not only the traditional notion of identity, but also the mainstream concept of culture, represents a limiting understanding of the person-culture relation, the first part of this article re-evaluates two main understandings of culture within psychology and then argue for a semiotic mediational conception that simultaneously guides and constrain not only intra- and inter-individual mechanisms, but also structures the socio-cultural sphere. What remains to be examined is: how exactly can personal agency and positioning be promoted and strengthened within the tensions of personal cultures and the socio-cultural sphere.