SOCSCI 1A MAIN TERMS

Social Construction of Knowledge

Each discipline must enshrine its knowledge territory in specific institutional forms; social scientists refer to this process of creation, perpetuation, transmission, and institutionalization of knowledge, or an accumulation of information rather than discovering objective facts.

Social Sciences

A shared devotion to the study of people and societies: anthropology, history, sociology, geography, psychology, sociology, political science, and economics. Each of these disciplines has its own particular meanings regarding social areas of concentration and theoretical orientation (research).

Ivory Tower of Knowledge (Michelle Foucault)

Academia privileges natural sciences and gatekeepers expertise and knowledge reproduction based on how academia is structured. There is less room for longitudinal studies in favor of shorter, quicker studies, and transparency and knowledge sharing may be discouraged due to competition.

Sociology of Knowledge

Interested in how different kinds of social organization make orderings of knowledge possible.

Teachers act as

Agents of social knowledge (Foucault describes as curriculum, pedagogy, punishment, and evaluation/learning).

Bernstein's Two Dimensions of Knowledge

Classification/boundaries between subjects, and framing.

Expert Knowledge

Knowledge can be socially distributed; different individuals and communities within a society know things at different depths. Experts in particular provide services for the wider society.

Knowledge is

Power. New knowledge can create new sites where power can be applied.

Subjugated Knowledge

Knowledge excluded from dominant discourse when a group's way of thinking and knowing itself becomes subject to a dominant culture.

Robert Proctor found that ignorance is not merely the absence of knowledge, but

A social product that can be "deliberately engineered," forgetting knowledge, or withheld (especially knowledge that contradicts other knowledge).

Stratification of Experience

The idea that a certain generation of people (e.g., Zoomers) may possess shared modes of thoughts, feelings, and experiences in contrast to other generations.

Thomas Khun and Scientific Revolutions

The scientific process was actually a series of revolutions or changes of fundamental worldview. A scientific revolution or change in scientific worldview is, in his words, a shift of paradigm.

Epistemic Culture

Cultures that create and warrant knowledge. Different disciplines do not abide by the same scientific method; each social science and their disciplines possess their own culture.

Natural

Our way of life was just "the way it had to be"; there was nothing in particular to understand.

Supernatural

Our way of life was given to us by non-human agents (spirits, ancestors, gods), and knowledge of this authorship of our society was sufficient.

Science as it has developed in the modern era is characterized by two key concepts

Law and cause.

History is more than just facts of the past, but also a

Narrative that assembles facts in some meaningful way and an evaluation, not just merely "what happened" but what we choose to remember and what it means for us today.

Is history always objective? No. Even when humans began to collect/write historical accounts, the primary concern was not to "get the facts right." Human beings have different motivations for invoking history, not just to get the story.

Who invented history as we generally view it now? Greeks.

Homer's epics are

Not history; they include Gods and mythology.

Thucydides and History

Had a narrower focus, considering defining conflicts of the ancient Greek era; he preserved speeches of the wars that he observed.

Hegel's Philosophy of History

History conveys the progress of freedom done collectively by humanity as a whole (not just specific individuals) and in key stages. The active force in human history is not the individual or community but the Idea.

Historicism

Any person, society, or state can be understood in historical context; looking at the past helps us see through the eyes of today.

Two Main Points about History

Knowledge of the past is entirely dependent on the sources that we have, methodology, and area of focus/interest. Historical thinking is based on the idea that there is such a thing as history (real, benefits from knowing).

Most modern historians do not consider the ancient writings of Egyptian, Sumerian, Hindu, and Hebrew chroniclers to be proper "histories" because

Rulers hired scribes to legitimize their own power, historiographies focused almost exclusively on political elites, and history and theology were mixed together.

Archaism

A response to societal decline in which certain members of society cling to and idealize an imagined past.

Historical Revisionism

A reexamination and critique of prevailing knowledge of the past (especially when we're given new information or new perspectives).

Contemporary Historical Thinking

Considers the decisions and actions of people in their chronological context, periodization, and historical change/continuity.

Citizenship is dependent on

Historical and cultural factors.

Three Rights of Citizenship

Political, legal, and social rights.

Political Science

The study of citizenship, politics, and power that can give us insight/perspective.

Aristotle and Political Science

He associated politics, the participation in a stable and happy society, with morality and ethics (virtue).

Plato and Political Science

His characters debate questions related to divine law and revelation, natural law, and education in relation to the law. His book Republic introduced the concept of justice and offered a description of his ideal society.

Machiavelli's The Prince

A ruler could effectively maximize their political power by leaning on their cultural traditions and longstanding folkways. Rulers should use people's love and fear against them; rule by fear was the best strategy.

Human Nature

The origins of all our knowledge are derived from how our physical beings sense/perceive the world around us.

Hobbe's Leviathan

He saw humans as competitive and selfish; the only solution was a powerful government with a considerable amount of power.

Rousseau and the Social Contract

A form of association which will defend and protect the person and goods of each associate.

Locke and Classical Liberalism

Freedom is the first virtue of society/limited government is the best way to guarantee it. Progress is possible in political affairs, State power should be limited, Economic inequality is not necessarily bad, and economic freedom is more important than economic equality.

Burke and Classical Conservatism

Because of the human tendency toward irrational behavior, humans need guidance from traditional authorities to enjoy peace and stability; should pass on long-standing moral teachings; and people should not have the freedom to violate moral precepts.

Marx and Classical Communism

The lower classes of societies would begin to understand their place and their shared interests, and developed class consciousness. Afterwards, they'll overthrow capitalism.

Power Elite

The probability that one actor in a social relationship will be in a position to carry out his will despite resistance, resting upon authority, persuasion, and coercion.

Where, in a society, is power located?

Distributed among different participants (pluralism) or people whose positions enable them to transcend ordinary people (elite power).

Giddens's Four Elements of a State

Political apparatus, sovereignty, territory, and national identity.

Historical Materialism

Practical human actions provide the "motor of history"; class-based issues and conflicts involving land ownership, labor, and wealth influence a society's thought and behavior.

Aristotle preferred monarchies, aristocracies and polities to democracies because

He was worried about an uninformed mob creating a "tyranny of the majority."

Economics

A study of how people organize the use of resources to satisfy their wants; a three-part process of production, distribution, and consumption, in which humans transform resources into goods and services.

Plato's Economics

His Republic describes a system where population and wealth are constant, and every element of economic/non-economic activity was strictly regulated. The result is a socio-moral order where specialization is imposed for the increase in efficiency.

Aristotle and Economics

In Politics and Ethics, the fundamental building-block of the economy was the household, which satisfied basic needs , introducing the division of labor, barter, and a means of overcoming the difficulties of barter (money). Also introduced use value and exchange value.

Feudalism

Self-sufficient production through the extraction of the labor of peasants attached to the land.

Physiocrats

Argued that wealth originated in labor, unlike the prevailing mercantilist belief that wealth was concentrated in the accumulation of gold.

Adam Smith and Economics

Argued for a rationality to the market; individuals have the choice to decide how much/what they want to produce. Most remembered for his characterization of a "self regulating market economy" as an "invisible hand" guiding the economy.

Marx and Capitalism

Capitalism operates on the basis of the surplus value of labor. This is unethical; if the workers eliminated the bourgeoisie, they could not only make their own decisions but could retain the full value of their productive activity.

Veblen and the Leisure Class

The upper class engages in conspicuous consumption, extravagant and unnecessary consumption for the purpose of displaying status, not fulfilling needs. He saw this behavior of the upper class as "idle rich."

Modern Economic Thought

Economics begins with assumptions, such as humans being rational, self-interested, and acting to maximize their interests (to buy at the lowest price/sell at the highest price).

Laissez-faire Economics

Free markets and free trade should be left alone from government intervention. It will provide the best conditions for economic growth, and things will settle themselves out.

Keynesian Economics

Capitalism works best with some government moderation. No guarantee laissez-faire markets will not eat themselves; markets are anything but stable.

Neoliberalism

The free market (and not the state) is the main mechanism for driving economic growth, the best way to promote economic growth.

Psychology

The scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

Plato and Psychology

Contrasted popular knowledge to real knowledge, which could not be perceived with the senses but with the mind. But the higher and truer world, the world of ideas, was not available to the senses.

Aristotle and Psychology

Knowledge does not originate in mental or intellectual activity but in studying nature with our senses as well as our mind. The three souls are vegetative, behavioral, and sensitive.

Epistemology

The study of the nature and possibility of knowledge.

Descartes and Psychology

I think, therefore I am; explore what we could know about the world with any certainty.

Hobbes and Psychology

Our senses are the source of knowledge, and the human body is the locus of the senses. Our imagination is created out of things that are perceived through our senses and memories (empiricist perspective).

Locke and Tabula Rasa

The mind at birth is blank or empty, and is filled as experience writes on this board.

Kant and Psychology

The mind brings its own concepts or "categories" to experience; humans experience the world through these innate and universal mental categories. The mind is not a passive receptor of knowledge but an active constructor.

Kant and Transcendental Idealism

Knowledge is a construction/interaction between the world and the human mind and body. Human knowledge would always bump up against the limitations of our senses and the inherited mental and physical traits.

Phrenology

You could study the shape of someone's skull to reveal their personality traits.

Wundt and Introspection

He would have subjects examine and describe their own mental experiences and processes.

Two Branches of Modern Psychology

The physiological understanding of the brain and nerve functions, and the study/treatment of mental illnesses.

Freud and Psychoanalysis

He began asking his patients to simply start talking about whatever they had on their minds and to share their dreams for interpretation.

Piaget and Psychology

We are not simply born understanding things like substance, quantity, or causality; it takes years to develop and understand them through interaction with the world. Focused on children.

Hume and Psychology

The theory of mind that posits humans are born without any built-in mental content, so that all knowledge comes from later perceptions or sensory experiences.

Themes of Modern Psychology

The interaction of biological and social factors, balance between theoretical knowledge and its practical applications, and the mind-body problem.

Freudian Perspective

The mind as composed of the id, ego, and superego; sexuality is a key element in the integration of body and mind; and childhood is vital in unpacking the development of the individual.

Sociological Imagination

The ability to see beyond the individual's immediate experience or "mind" to the forces that operate on, integrate, and construct individuals.

Vico and Sociology

Revealed that there are hidden human forces which create society, and that society is in this way a self-created entity.

Comte's Three Stages of Sociology

Theological, Metaphysical, and Positive.

Spencer and Social Darwinism

Societies fall on various levels of a social scale and that more "advanced" societies are apt to defeat and dominate less advanced or more "primitive" ones

Marx and Sociology

Every society was a "social formation" built upon the base of its practical, material, economic activity. Classes clashed over their conflicting interests, which drove the historical evolution of societies.

Durkheim and Collective Conscience

All members performed in primitive societies the same tasks and were interchangeable, shared social knowledge and values, and held together by common sentiments of kinship and affection. Modern societies have members that perform different tasks or jobs, could not share social knowledge and values, held together by mutual dependence through formal mechanisms like law and contracts.

Weber and Sociology

Sociology for him was a science concerning itself with the interpretive understanding of social action with a causal explanation of its course and consequences.

Anthropology

The science of mankind and humanity.

Anthropological Perspective

Comparative/cross-cultural study that examines humans in all their diversity; holism/investigating each aspect of human society in connection with all other aspects, and relativism/understanding each human society in terms of or "relative to" its own ideas.

Four Types of Anthropology

Linguistic, cultural/social, biological/physical, archeology.

Ethnology (Cultural)

The description of particular peoples and ways of life.

Primatology (Physical)

The study of non-human primates (monkeys & apes). The study of chimps has revealed that they are capable of very human-like relationships, language, and tool manufacturing.

Paleoanthropology (Physical)

The study of human evolution based on the fossil record. This involves going way back into the periods of our earliest humans and ancestors (ex. Lucy in Ethiopia; suggests a bridge between humans and apes).

Herodotus, Xenophanes, and Anthropology

Explored ethnocentrism, evaluating other cultures according to our own preconceptions originating in the standards/customs of our own culture.

Lewis Henry Morgan and Unilinear Evolution

Wanted to apply Social Darwinism to cultures, championing the idea that human societies evolve over time, inhabiting different stages.

Anthropology has always had some close relationship with

Psychology.

Participant Observation

The immersion in the culture to achieve acceptance; the ethnographer takes part in chores, festivals, ritual events, etc., in order to attain an emic (insider) perspective.

The Evolutionary Approach

The theory that all societies advance through distinct "stages" of development based on technological advances.

Ethnography

The process of writing about and documenting specific societies

Physical Geography

The physical side of geography; focuses on the description and analysis of the natural features and processes of the earth, like rivers and mountains and oceans.

Cultural/Human Geography

The social branch of geography; pays attention to how humans relate to, interact with, and influence and are influenced by the physical environment.

Geography and cartography were

Saturated with cultural/political interests as well as current beliefs.

Kant promoted geography as a

Physical, moral, and political science (physical, natural, and regional).

Fives Themes of Human/Cultural Geography

Region, mobility, nature-culture, globalization, and cultural landscape.

Nature-Culture

The complex relationships between people and the physical environment, including how culture, politics, and economies affect people's ecological situation and resource use.

Possibilism

The notion that any environment offers a number of different possible ways for a culture to develop, and that the choices among these possibilities are guided by cultural heritage.