sociology unit 1

social institutions

A complex group of interdependent positions that collectively perform some social role in society and reproduce themselves over time

Culture

The ideas, beliefs, values and symbols of a society, this is time and place specific (macro idea)

Human interaction

the processes and manner in which social actors relate to each other (how we interact with each other)

Social Structure

The enduring and patterned, orderly relationship between institutions and people as well as other elements of a given society

Macro

Global, national. social structure and social institutions

Meso

National, regional, local, social institutions, culture

Micro

Small and large groups, human interaction, social psychology

Emile Durkheim

proposed a typology about suicide based on death statistics i France in the late 1800s, also functionalism

Egoistic

Individuals who are no integrated properly into other groups

ex. protestants vs. Catholics

Altruistic

to well integrated

Anomic

Lack of norms

ex. the bank excs during the great deppression

Fatalistic

too many norms, always know what your doing, and feeling imprisoned

ex. prison

Anomie

Lack of normlessness 

Sociological Imagination

Social Analyzation, connection between ideas, not purely individual

Strangening the familiar

a conceptual tool of looking at your culture or society that you are familiar with and looking at it as if you were an outsider

France, Auguste Compte

Credited with coining the term sociology, wanted to apply physical science methods to social life.

thought sociology could be a perfect science of the management of human potential.

believed there was a truth to be found about social life and wanted to understand it more systematically 

how do we manage society

Harriet Martineau

translator of Compte from French to English, she is credited with the popularization of social science as she made it more accessible to the public

Karl Marx

Creator of conflict theory. believed class conflict was the driver of history

conflict theory

Economics drives everything, and class is defined by the relationship we have at the means of production(how we make things), culture comes from economics

Division of labor

How do we divide production between workers. the capitalist tendency is to divide as it benefits those in power

Alienation

the separation between the workers and the product of their labor. comes back to this idea that we enjoy producing things, and that this separates the worker from self

False Consciousness

most common/most popular idea is to support the upper class, when it doesn’t actually benefit us

ex. American society: work hard and you can get anywhere which allows us to relate to billionaires as if they were similar to us when they are not

Functionalism

Believed that all products were of social, bad at explaining change but good at explaining where we are now

Division of labor

interested in how we interact at different economic status and how that effects us (functionalism)

mechanical solidarity

is when you don’t know where stuff comes from, industrialized society that has a lot of redundancy and can replace people and society will be the same(func)

Organic solidarity

most often this is a traditional society where society acts like the organs in the body. you cant just replace a part of it. there are complimentary needs and different skills that work together. people know where their stuff comes from(func)

Anomie

our understanding of norms, we are not sure about our norms as much in industrialized society(func)

norms

what is a normal thing to do in different culture(func)

ex. kissing in France

collective effervescence

the experience of the group feeling which is less common in mechanical solidarity

ex. sports game

Interpretive theory

Invented by Max Weber, a meso-level theory. understanding meaning from different perspectives, as meaning can change and is socialized

Industrialization was very creative, but as market logic and bureaucracy take over, we become trapped in the iron cage.

Max Weber(vaber)

wanted to be able to explain the increasingly bureaucratic management in everyday life. He believed that industrialization was a 

protestant ethic

transition from feudalism to capitalism in the churches. catholic church should not have control over peoples relationship to god

catholic church was of the belief that people who were rich were going to heaven 

critical theory

dynamics of power and inequality, includes feminist theory, critical race theory, and queer theory

W.E.B. Du Bois

studied the intersection between class and race, and how those of the lower class, who should have banded together to help each other, split into the white and black farmers. Economic class is not the only driver. combined conflict and interpretive

double consciousness

What black Americans notice that white Americans don’t notice and that main stream white American culture has standards that don’t include black Americans

Jane Addams

credited with inventing social work, and using empirical methods to gather survey research when others were not doing so

symbolic interaction

It is about one on one and small group interactions. they study labels, meanings, symbols, and stage metaphors

also believe that we put on a series of masks to others and adapt who we are depending on who we are interacting with. There is also no true self.

Erving Goffman

when interactions as individuals don’t go smoothly. questioned how those with disabilities deal with stigma and people who are uncomfortable interacting with them.

socialization

the process of learning about values, morals, beliefs, and ways of acting and thinking that are expected in society(learning the basics of society)

primary socialization

learning the basic norms of society, ends around puberty

secondary socialization

learning specialized norms for specific circumstances

ex. a job, college, etc

Resocialization

socialization where we adopt new norms and identities

Total institutions

Institutions that exert near total control over members lives and engage in resocialization

ex. prison, military and camps

social status

a persons or groups socially determined positrons within a large group or society

social role

a set of expectations concerning the behavior and attitudes of people who occupy a particular social status

ascribed status

assigned to a person by wider society often at birth

ex. age, gender, race

achieved statues

a result of our own efforts

ex. student, hobby, political status

master statuses

these depend on the context, but are the most obvious or dominant status in a given situation.

roles

the set of expectations about the behavior and attitudes of people who occupy a particular social status

ex. students study and take classes and eat in the dinning hall

role conflict

two different statuses with two separate roles that conflict

ex. working and being a student

role strain

conflicting expectations within one role

ex. being a student and needing to study but also have a social life

rules of social structure

the formal and informal expectations for behaving in any given situation

resources in social structure

the things we have acquired such as money, education, cultural capital, and social capital. all these things help us follow rules and achhive what we want in life

structure of opportunity

the distribution of resources and opportunities across society that shapes the choices individuals have the option to make

agency

our capacity to act given the structural rules and resources that impact our behavior

life chances

opportunities to provide yourself with material goods, positive living conditions, and favorable life experiences

cycle of oppertunity

what is the distribution of rules and resources and what does having mean for opportunities 

cultural capital

knowledge about how to navigate social institutions, understanding norms and expectations in a wide range of circumstance, and other knowledge that is useful for social mobility

social capital

who you know. social networks which are useful for social mobility or maintaining class position

George Herbert Mead

the I is ourselfves and us acting on our own desires, the me is how we are reguarded by others.

generalized other

common cultural expectations of society we learn to refer to with respect to our behavior

what’s normal to do in a situation

looking glass self

Charles Horton Cooley, the way our perception of how specific others see us affects our sense of self

dramaturgy

frontstage and backstage(how we present ourselves vs. how we actually feel) the successful enactment of the role and failing that means the frontstage and backstage are breached

reference group

the group, real or imaginary, whose standpoint is used as the frame of reference by the actor

primary group

usually small, face to face, includes significant other, serves expressive functions(emotional and role support)

ex. parents, key teachers and best friends

secondary groups

direct material needs

ex. professional groups like coworkers

symbols

material or immaterial objects to which groups affix meaning to

rituals

routinized and highly important group activities

ex. Pledge of allegiance and grad practices

collective effervesce

powerful group expedites around the sacred

secularization hypothesis

as economies become more affluent, religiosity decreases

material culture

physical goods, often circulated in an economic system

ex. clothing, media, books, consumer goods

symbolic culture

beliefs, values, logos, colors, ideas

sapir-whorf hypothesis

siggests languages shape thoughts and thus behavior

collective representations

groupings of symbolic and material culture

ex. memorial day,

subculture

groups that use alternative symbolic and material cultural goods to distinguish themselves from wider society

counterculture

a group that actively rejects some of the larger cultural/societies norms and values

high culture

attuned to elite and upper-class sensibilities

popular culture

associated with pleasure, the mundane the masses

functionalism on deviance

deviance serves a social function, it tells us right and wrong and establishes boundaries for individuals as well as between in and out groups

strain theory

deviance occurs when there’s a mismatch between goals and socially acceptable means to achieve them

Folkways

customs and traditions

mores

strongly held beliefs, breaking will illicit strong responses

laws

Formal norms, encoded in the government and enforced by the state, these can be a combination of both folkways and mores. institutional norms that are written down and enforced

formal sanctions

– explicitly happening because you broke a norm

informal sanctions

o   boos in a crowd, peoples faces, how people react to us

internalized sanctions

o   how we internalize the reactions people may have to us and the consequences that may happen to us. Also how we discipline ourselves

conformity

Most people are conformity, seek socially acceptable goals and go with the socially sanctioned/institutional way to get that way (++)

innovation

barred from using socially approved means to achieve goals and have to find another way (+-)

 Auxiliary alternative

barred from using institutional means, like being banned from boy scouts, having a group to call your own, you find a different way to do

Rationalism

going to California but not being an actor or celebrity but do small time plays and art things that are still part of the institutional means but you aren’t going for that really high up thing that is often wanted in cultural goals (-+)

Retreatism

§  choosing not to participate in either by avoiding, like being a hippie (--)

Rebellion

denying and trying to subvert cultural goals and using institutional means to do so. Doesn’t have to be violent but ted Kavinsky was. (+/-+/-)

conflict theory on deviance

o   Rules are designed to benefit the elite, those in positions of power.

o   Deviance serves to maintain the status quo, and is an exercise of social power when defining deviance and crime

Labeling theory

theory that devience is created through reactions to an act. Who gets to do the labeling often is a function of coal power

moral panic

o   overheated short lived, period ofs immense concern about an issue, sometimes cyclical, mismatch between empirical evidence and the worry about what’s happening

o   – people who try to influence societies toward increased awareness of concern over the violation of social norms, they conduct “moral campaigns”.   

Stigma

Which person is discredit and rejected or has difficulty in the presentation itself and this involves interactions language by society because this attribute they have

Super predator

§  – made everyone go crazy about this super predator idea of how crime was going to keep increasing, and young people should be tried for as adults

Moral entrepreneurs

§  experts, media, public officials, people don’t like trying to predict because if you get wrong can have very bad outcomes

Satanic panic

period of overheated social concern of the existence of satanic cults. Little to no empirical evidence of these cults and that they were sacrificing children and people