Sociology-Chapter 5

Deviance

The breaking of our norms and values, considered more subjective "what do you see as bad behavior?”

Crime

is socially defined, there is nothing in the natural world that exists as "criminal", it only becomes criminal when human beings create a law and then say it is criminal

Indictable

More severe crimes with more serious punishments. Examples include murder, robbery, and major fraud.

Summary

Much less serious offences, with fittingly less severe punishments. Examples include minor assaults, theft under a certain amount, or public mischief.

Hybrid

A combination of both offences. They can be treated as one or the other, dependent on the other factors of the case. The punishment may vary as a result.

4 different types of people believed to be witches in the early era

-Children

-Disabilities

-Elderly

-Economically independent women

4 Eras of western Europe

1. Early

2. Classical

3. Statistical

4. Positive

Beccaria

A guy who stood up against the witch hunt beliefs from the early period. Beccaria drove for change, and ultimately helped to create the modern day criminal justice system.

Beccaria’s points

1. People are rational

2. Criminals weigh the consequences of their actions

3. Advocated to write down laws and attach harsh punishments for the breaking of those laws

4. People will be deterred from committing the crime (deterrence theory)

Claims making

The social constructionist process by which groups assert grievances about the trouble-some character of people or their behavior

Control theory

A category of explanation that maintains that people engage in deviant behavior when the various controls that might be expected to prohibit them from doing so are weak or absent

Corporate crime

Crime committed on behalf of a corporation

Cultural support theory

A category of explanation that argues people become and remain deviant because the cultural environments in which they find themselves teach deviance and define such behavior as appropriate

Master Status

A status characteristic that overrides other status characteristics in terms of how others see an individual (such as murderer, drug addict, cheater)

Self

In Mead’s theory, an emergent entity with a capacity to be both a subject and an object to assign meaning to itself, as reflected upon in one’s own mind. In Goffman’s dramaturgical theory, the self is a more shifting “dramatic effect”, a staged product of the scenes one performs in.

Situated transaction

A process of social interaction that lasts as long as the individuals find themselves in each other’s company. As applied to the study of deviance, the concept of situated transaction helps us understand how deviant acts are social and not just individual

Social constructionism

The sociological theory that argues that social problems and issues are less objective conditions than they are collective social definitions based on how they framed and interpreted

Social control

Various and myriad ways in which members of social groups express their disapproval; of people, behaviors and conditions.

Social groups

Group of people who feel more united and bounded to one another in a common identity

Status degradation ceremony

The rituals by which formal transition is made from non-deviant to deviant status. An example could be the criminal trial process or the psychiatric hearing

Strain theory

A category of explanation that seeks to understand how deviant behavior results as people attempt to solve problems that the social structure presents to them