Sociology Chp. 6-10

Social Deviance

any transgression of socially established norms

Informal Deviance

minor violations of social norms that may or may not be punished

Crime

the violation of laws enacted by society

• crime is formal deviance

Social Control

mechanisms that create normative compliance in individuals

• formal social sanctions

• informal social sanctions

  • unspoken rules of life

Emile Durkheim - Functionalist

society is a single, complex organism with many internal organs that perform specific tasks to keep the social organisms alive and healthy

Social Cohesion

social bonds; how well people relate to eachother

Mechanical Solidarity

social cohesion based on sameness

Organic Solidarity

social cohesion based on difference and interdependence of the parts

Punitive Justice

focuses on making violators suffer and thus defines the boundaries of acceptable behaviors

Rehabilitative Justice

examines the specific circumstances of individual transgressors and attempts to find ways to rehabilitate them

Durkheim’s Normative Theory of Suicide

• he wanted to explain the social roots of suicide

• suicide = social deviance

Social Integration

the extent to which you are integrated into your social group or community

Social Regulation

the number of roles guiding your daily life and, more specifically, what you can reasonably expect from the world on a day-to-day basis

Strain Theory

Robert Merton’s theory that deviance occurs when a society does not give all of its members equal ability to achieve socially accepted goals

• the strain in strain theory arises when the means don't match up to those ends

Conformist

accepts both the socially acceptable goals and socially acceptable strategies to achieve those goals

• ex. going to college, getting a 9-5 job, buying a house, having a family

Ritualists

rejects socially defined goals but not the means

• ex. a person who goes to college and works a 9-5 job but no goal of achieving success or wealth

Innovator

accepts socially acceptable goals but rejects socially acceptable means to achieve them 

• ex. stay at home parent, big time drug dealer

Retreatist

both socially acceptable means and goals by completely retreating from society

• Ex. the amish

Rebel

rejects both traditional goals and traditional means and wants to alter or destroy the social institutions from which they are alienated

• ex. Governor of California speaking up about the federal government hurting all

Labeling Theory

the belief that individuals subconsciously notice how others see or label them, and their reactions to those labels over time from the basis of their self-identity

Broken Window Theory of Deviance

theory explaining how social clues impact whether individuals act deviantly - specifically, whether local informal, social Norma's allow deviant acts

Socioeconomic Status

an individuals position in a stratified social order

• upper class, middle class, working class, poor

Stratification

the hierarchical organization of a society into groups with differing levels of power, social prestige, or status and economic resources

Income

money received by a person for work, from transfers (gifts, inheritances, or government assistance), or from returns on investments

Wealth 

a family’s or individuals net worth (I.e. total assets minus total debts)

Upper Class

a term for the economic elite

Middle Class

a term commonly used to describe those individuals with no manual jobs that pay significantly more than the poverty line

Poor

no clear distinction between the working class and poor

Rousseau: Humans Good, Property Bad

argued that private property creates social inequality, which ultimately leads to social conflict

Social Equality

a condition in which no differences in wealth, power, prestige, or status based on non-natural conventions exist

Structural Functionalism

inequality is functional in society because it helps allocate the best people to the most important roles

Conflict Theory

the idea that conflict between competing interests is the basic, animating force of social change and society in general

• stability is maintained through domination and power, not consensus

Equality of Opportunity

the idea that everyone has an equal chance to achieve wealth, social prestige, and power because the rules of the game, so to speak, are the same for everyone

• Example: Anti Discrimination Laws

Equality of Condition

the idea that everyone should have an equal starting point

• Example: Affirmative Action

Equality of Outcome

the idea that each player must end up with the same amount regardless of the fairness of the “game”

Free Rider Problem

the notion that when more than one person is responsible for getting something done, the incentive is for each individual to neglect responsibility and hope others will pull the weight

Status Hierarchy System

a system of stratification based on social prestige

Social Mobility

the movement between different positions within a system of social stratification in any given society

• horizontal

• verticle

Structural Mobility

mobility that is inevitable from changes in the economy 

• example: the expansion of high tech jobs in the past 20 years

Exchange Mobility

mobility resulting from the swapping of jobs

Status - Attainment Model

approach that ranks individuals by socioeconomic status, including income and educational attainment, and seeks to specify the attributes characteristics of people who end up in more desirable occupations

• research shows that parental education and net worth, not occupation or income, best predicts children’s educational and other outcomes

Sex

the perceived biological differences that society typically used to distinguish males from females (female, intersex, male)

Gender

a social position; a set of attributes that are associated with sex identities (boy, girl, masculine, feminine, androgynous)

Sexuality

desire, sexual preference, and intimate behavior (heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, etc.)

Essentialist

arguments explaining social phenomena in terms of natural, biological, or evolutionary inevitability 

• focuses on a binary system

Transgender

describes people whose gender does not correspond to their birth sex

Cisgender

describes people whose gender corresponds to their birth sex

Hegemonic Masculinity

the condition in which men are dominant and privileged

Patriarchy

a nearly universal system involving the subordination of femininity to masculinity

Sexism

a form of prejudice that occurs when a person’s sex or gender is the basic for judgement, Discrimination, or other differential treatment against that person

Emotional Labor

managing emotions and their outward expression to meet the expectations of a job, especially in service sector work and female dominated occupations

Glass Ceiling

an invisible limit on women’s climb up the occupational ladder

Glass Escalator

the accelerated promotion of men to the top of a work organization, especially in feminized jobs

Heteronormativity

the idea that heterosexuality is the default or normal sexual orientation from which other sexualities derive

Race

a group of people who share a set of characteristics - typically, but not always, physical ones (hair texture, skin color) - and are said to share a common bloodline

Racism

the belief that members of separate races possess different and unequal traits

Ethnicity

one’s ethnic quality or affiliation

• voluntary, self-defined, non hierarchical, fluid and multiple, and based on cultural differences, not physical ones per se

Racialization

the information of a new racial identity by drawing ideological boundaries of difference around a formerly unnoticed group of people

• ex: 9/11, Muslim Americans being treated differently

• ex: Asian hate at beginning of COVID pandemic

Prejudice

thoughts and feelings about an ethnic or racial group, which lead to preconceived notions and judgments (often negative) about the group

Discrimination

harmful or negative acts (not mere thoughts) against people deemed inferior on the basis of their racial category, without regard to their individual merit

Color-Blind Racism

the view that racial inequality is perpetuated by a supposedly color-blind stance that ends up reinforcing historical and contemporary inequalities, disparate impact, and institutional bias by “ignoring” them in favor of a technically neutral approach

Institutional Racism

institutions and social dynamics that may seem race-neutral but actually disadvantage minority groups

• criminal justice

• educational system

• workplace

Endogamy

marriage to someone within one’s social group

Exogamy

marriage to someone outside one’s social group

Nuclear Family

familial form consisting of a father, a mother, and their children

Extended Family

kin networks that extend outside or beyond the nuclear family

Cult of Domesticity

the notion that true womanhood centers on domestic responsibility and child rearing

Second Shift

the work that takes place at home after the day of paid labor

Blended Family

a family with step parents, step children, and sometimes step siblings

Miscegentation

the technical term for interracial marriage, literally meaning “a mixing of kinds”, it is politically and historically charged, and sociologists generally prefer the term of exogamy or outmarriage