Sociology Midterm 1

Stratification

A system that puts categories of people into a hierarchy

How social class is formed

Some common foundations for this include religion, gender, wealth, race —> inequality

Social class

A group of individuals who share a similar economic position based on income, wealth, education, and occupation

Income

The total amount of money that someone erns each year

Wealth

The total amount of money that a person has or could have if they sold off all their assets

Gilbert Kahl model

Model that includes 6 social classes that are situated within 3 broad categories

Top - first category - privileged classes (capitalist classes + upper middle class)

Middle - second category - majority classes (middle class + working class)

Bottom - third category - lower classes (working poor + underclass)

Privileged classes

Capitalist class and upper middle class are both under the category ….

Capitalist class

Top 1% of POP

Makes money from the things they own like stocks, bonds, real estate, and/or large businesses

Super rich

Wealth brings them lucrative profits

Upper middle class

14% of POP

Well-educated individuals who rely on their incomes from professional jobs like doctors, lawyers, accountants, etc

Working rich under this category

Working rich

Individuals whose annual incomes are well into the six-figure range

Majority classes

55% of pop

Middle class + working class = this category

Middle class

Likely to have a high school diploma and some college experience (an increasing number have a bachelor’s degree)

Working class

Completed high school or a trade school

Lower classes

1/3rd of POP!

Includes working poor (15%) and underclass (15%)

Most do not have high school diploma for this category

Working poor

Typically employed in insecure and low-wage jobs

People who spent at least 27 weeks (half of the last year) in the labor force but whose incomes still fell below the official poverty level

Underclass

Part time workers, unemployed, disabled, inconsistent or unreliable work opportunites (seasonal work)

Ascribed status

You acquire this when you were born or that you take on involuntarily later in life

Achieved status

You gain this at least in part through your achievements, abilities, or efforts

Social mobility

Moving from an ascribed social class to a new achieved social class position

Upward mobility

Moving from a lower class position into a higher one

Downward mobility

Dropping into a lower social class

Cumulative advantages

Built up benefits and resources that allow people to increase their wealth

Racial wealth gap

The difference in accumulated wealth between racial and ethnic groups

GINI index

A statistical measure that compares inequality

Looks at how family income is distributed in a country

0

The number of the GINI score if everyone in the country had the same income and there was total equality

1

The number of the GINI score if one person in the country had all of the income → total inequality

Absolute poverty

People without the basic necessities of life (food, shelter, clothing)

Considered poor

Poverty threshold/poverty line

Establishes the minimum income level that the federal government says is required to buy the basic necessities of life

Relative poverty

A measure that takes into account the relative economic status of people in a society by looking at how income is distributed

Those in the lowest income brackets would be considered poor in comparison to others in their society

Homeless

Lacking a fixed, regular, or adequate nighttime residence

Point in time count

How the homeless population in the United States is established by

Sheltered homeless

People staying in emergency shelters, transitional housing programs, or safe havens

Unsheltered homelessness

Primary nighttime residence is a public or private place not designated for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping space, such as the streets, vehicles, or parks

Chronic homelessness

Someone with a disability who has a) been continuously homeless for a year or more or b) has experienced at least four episodes of homelessness in the past three years where the combined length of the homeless episodes is at least 12 months

Structural ; Individual factors

Factors that increase the risk of homelessness are ____ and ______.

Structural factors

changes in the housing market, employment opportunities, criminal justice policies, and institutional support for poor people and people with disabilities

Individual characteristics

disabilities, mental illness, addiction, felony record

Housing Choice Voucher Program

a federal program for low-income families (and the elderly and disabled) to afford decent and safe housing in the private market, including single-family homes, townhouses, and apartments

Meritocracy

a system where personal responsibility and individual effort are the sole determinants of success

Factors associated with poverty from high to low

• Household type: single mother household (HIGHEST POVERTY)

• Education: not completing high school

• Paid work: no income

• Disability status: living with a disability

• Race: Black, Hispanic, or Native Americans 

• Region: The South (US)

• Concentrated neighborhood poverty: high poverty neighborhoods

• Child poverty (experiencing poverty as a child) (LOWEST POVERTY)

Race

A system that humans created to classify and stratify groups of people based mostly on skin tone and other phenotypic characteristics, such as eye shape and hair texture

• used to create, maintain, and enhance group distinctions and disparities

Ethnicity

Common culture, religion, history, or ancestry shared by a group of people

• not always tied to shared characteristics

ex) Arab

One-drop rule

A person with any African ancestry at all, no matter how little, was Black

Social construct

How sociologists describe race

A concept that humans invented and gave meaning to in order to understand or justify some dimension of the social world

Eugenics

The idea that we can actively improve the genetic profile of humans, led to forced sterilization of groups of people labeled as unfit to reproduce

Phenotype

Set of our visible features or characteristics, like the color of our skin, hair and eyes

Affected by both genetics and our environment

Most individuals’ phenotypic features change over their lives

• used as justifications for racial classification and exploitation

Bias

tendency to favor or disfavor certain things, regardless of the details of the specific situation

Implicit bias

subconscious positive or negative association our minds make between seemingly unrelated things, such as a racial group and a positive or negative attribute

Explicit bias

bias that we are openly and consciously aware of

Internalized bias

occurs when a person belonging to a marginalized racial group associates their own group with negative evaluations

Stereotypes

widely shared perceptions about the personal characteristics, tendencies, or abilities of members of a particular group, like intelligence, personality, physical features, preferences, aggressiveness, or criminality

Prejudices

preconceived beliefs, attitudes, and opinions about members of a group

Group threat theory

How prejudice grows when we begin to think of another group as an economic, political, or cultural threat

Ultimate attribution error

A tendency to perceive undesirable characteristics or behaviors exhibited by members of another group as an innate or natural part of their personality or essence

Cognitive dissonance

A psychological state in which our preexisting ideas do not match what we see with our own eyes

Contact theory

Gordon Allport

Explains how interactions with members of other groups affects prejudices

Interaction and exposure can be beneficial UNDER THE FOLLOWING CONDITIONS

• the interaction has to occur in a collaborative, voluntary, and non-competitive space;

• we must interact multiple times, not just once;

• our interaction must be personal, informal, and one-on-one;

• the interaction should be legal;

• and the setting must allow participants to interact as equals

Audit study

Sociological method in which applicants are matched according to all characteristics that would make them more or less attractive and then sent out as pairs to apply for various services or products

Racial discrimination

The differential treatment of people based on their presumed racial group

Negative racial discrimination

unfavorable and unjust treatment of a person based on their racial group membership

Positive racial discrimination

efforts used to rectify historical and contemporary forms of negative discrimination

Racism

a set of beliefs, ideologies, or institutional practices that are based on the idea that one racial group is biologically or culturally inferior to another group and that reproduces racial domination and exploitation

White supremacy

A set of beliefs, ideologies, and institutional practices that position white people as superior to other racial groups

Institutional racism

The ways that core institutions — like the law, education, and labor market — are embedded with racial biases and practices that reproduce racial inequality

Jim Crow

a period in American history between the end of Reconstruction in the late nineteenth century and the end of the Civil Rights Movement of the mid-twentieth century

Programs established during this era disproportionately excluded Black citizens and other citizens of color from their benefits

Civil Rights Movement

a large-scale, Black-led social movement in the 1950s and 1960s centered around protest, civil disobedience, and legal battles

Affirmative action

initially referred to policies or programs that sought to remedy past discrimination through active measures to ensure equal opportunity now

Reparations

recognition of and compensation (typically financial) for past harm against specific people or groups

Immigrant selectivity

the process whereby people who immigrate to the U.S. from certain countries have a unique demographic profile compared to the people who stay behind in their home countries

Life expectancy

A statistical measure of how long people can expect to live, on average

Transgender

People whose gender identity and expression are different from what they were assigned at birth

Nonbinary

Not exclusively masculine or feminine

Cisgender

Someone whose gender matches the sex they were assigned at birth

Sex

The different biological and physiological characteristics of males and females, such as reproductive organs, chromosomes, and hormones

Gender

The socially constructed characteristics of women and men — such as norms, roles, and relationships among and between groups of women and men

Nature

biological influences

Nurture

Social influences

Gender norms

Social definitions of behavior assigned to particular sex categories

Social construction of gender

Meanings of gender are created through social interaction and social norms

Do gender

Perform actions that PRODUCE gender

We do this through interactions with others, and we take into consideration what is believed to be appropriate for our gender

Gender binary

One of many gender systems that have existed among human societies

Within this system, there has always been some room for change, growth, and flexibility

Androgynous

Incorporating both feminine and masculine characteristics

Misgendering / deadnaming

Referring to someone by a gender or name with which they no longer identify

Bathroom bills

Banned trans people from using school or public bathrooms that match their gender identity

Gender affirming care

Therapies or treatments, ranging from counseling to medical interventions such as hormone treatments, aimed at “supporting and affirming an individual’s gender identity when it conflicts with the one they were assigned at birth”

Intersectionality

The ways at which different types of social relations are linked together in complex ways, creating very different experiences for different groups of people

• argues that gender, race, class, (dis)ability, sexuality, geography, and other characteristics intersect and interact to shape individual experience

Ethnocultural norms

Cultural differences of the ethnic groups to which we belong

Gender inequality

Individuals or groups are treated and perceived differently based upon their gender

Feminism

A collection of movements that advocate for equality for all sexes and genders

Buck v. Bell (1927)

Court case that stated that states have the right to sterilize individuals who were considered unfit to have children

Intersectional feminism

Takes into account the needs of all women and their differences along lines of race/ethnicity, nationality, social class, religion, gender expression, body type, (dis)ability, and other characteristics

Glass ceiling

Both obvious and invisible barriers to advancement that women and minorities face at work

Motherhood penalty

the systematic disadvantages in wages, benefits, and other career factors that are associated with motherhood

Fatherhood bonus

Benefit in wages and perceived competence; apparent even when both parents work full time

Acquaintance rape

Rape or sexual assault that occurs between people who already know each other

Victim blaming

When survivors are viewed as responsible for the assaults

Rape myths

Stereotyped or false beliefs about sexual violence that may excuse or naturalize the perpetrator’s behavior while shifting responsibility to the victim

Intimate partner violence (IPV)

AKA domestic violence

Abuse occurring between current or former spouses or romantic partners

Proxy violence

Harming or threatening to harm someone else if the victim tries to leave

Reproductive coercion

forcing parenthood on an unwilling partner through means ranging from violence to contraceptive sabotage; the resulting parenthood can increase the victim’s dependence on the abuser

Financial abuse

preventing the victim from working or restricting their access to money they’ve earned

Hypersexual

Extreme in sexual appearance or desire