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Exam Date - March 27th Chapters - 9, 11, 8 Topics - Education, Political Sociology, and Families
Socialization
Process through which people come to share the values and practices of a society.
Sorting
Process of dividing students into groups, often based on ideas about intelligence or achievement.
Achievement ideology
Belief that anyone can succeed through education and hard work.
Social reproduction
Process through which schools perpetuate the class structure.
Social capital
Resources people access through their relationships or social networks.
Cultural capital
Knowledge, habits, and skills valued by institutions.
Institutionalized racism
Racism that is built into policies and practices.
Achievement gap
Differences in academic outcomes between groups of students.
Opportunity gap
Differences in opportunities and resources available to groups of students.
Coleman Report
Study of U.S. schooling that identified student background as the most powerful influence on achievement.
Social construct
A category that can take on the appearance of “scientific fact,” but is actually the product of society and culture.
De jure segregation
Segregation of schools enforced by law.
De facto segregation
Segregation of schools created by residential segregation.
Double segregation
Concentration of large numbers of low-income students of color in particular schools.
Heteronormativity
Assumption that individuals are heterosexual and that biological sex and gender expressions are aligned.
Hidden curriculum
Unofficial messages to students that are communicated through rules, routines, arrangements of classrooms, and interactions.
Tracking
Process of sorting students into different groups based on ideas about ability, achievement, or prospects.
Second-generation segregation
Racial segregation within schools because of racialized patterns in tracking assignments.
Education policy
Decisions about school-related issues, including funding, operations, curriculum, student assignment, and staffing.
No Child Left Behind Act
2001 federal law that mandated regular standardized testing and set consequences for low-performing schools.
Charter schools
Privately run but publicly funded schools.
Politics
The ability of people or groups to gain access to government and use its power to influence society
Nation state
Countries where people share a national language or culture
Democracy
Political system in which people can directly vote for their representatives or even on specific rules or policies
Lobbying
Contacting elected representatives to argue for a particular position
Activists
People who believe normal methods of exerting political influence are insufficient or illegitimate
Social movements
Groups organized to push for social change through contentious means. Also called protest movements
Revolutionary movements
Social movements that lead to the fall of governments
State
Ultimate authority within some geographical territory, with a monopoly on the use of force within that area.
Monopoly force
Having the only legitimate claim to use force
Taxation
Using the force of government to collect funds that are used to pay for services.
Welfare states
States where a large part of the budget is spent on social services.
Policy
Rules, laws, and services provided by a government
Axis of politics
How states are made, acquire power, and use power to further goals through policy
Democratic society
Citizens or residents get to vote on who runs the state
City State
Government controls a single city and the surrounding area
Direct democracy
People vote directly on policies through a referendum
Representative democracy
People influence the state and its policies by voting for representatives
Competitive democracy
Voters have genuine options and alternatives when voting
Aristocracy
Government ruled by royalty
Formal policies
Those written into law
Informal policies
Widespread methods of regulating behavior that are not written into law
Political parties
Networks of people and organizations that represent particular interests or positions
Median voter model
Predicts that governments offer policies that reflect the preferences of voters in the center
Salience
Degree to which people care about an issue
Elite theory
Predicts that governments offer policies preferred by elites
Pluralist theory
Predicts that government policies will reflect the balance of power between various interest groups
Electoral college system
System in which presidential votes are tallied at the state level, rather than from a simple national count of all votes.
Suffrage
The right to vote
Electorate
Group of people allowed to vote
Reconstruction
Period after the U.S. Civil War in which civil and political rights for African Americans were expanded in the Southern states.
Poll tax
Fee charged for voting
Literacy test
Test of reading ability administered to determine who was allowed to vote.
Grandfather Clause
Laws passed in Southern states restricting voting to only those individuals whose grandfathers could vote.
Black codes
Laws that barred African Americans from holding certain jobs
Civil Rights Movement
Social movement aimed at increasing civil and political rights and protections for African Americans.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
National law that made discrimination based on race or ethnicity illegal.
Voting Rights Acts of 1965
Federal law that barred states from discriminating against Black voters.
Brown v. Board of Education
Supreme Court ruling that ended legally-enforced segregation.
Liberal
Political position that supports more taxation so governments can provide a wider array of services
Social conservatives
Voters who emphasize religious values and oppose changing social roles.
Ideologies
System of ideas
Liberal states
Governments that are fairly permissive in economic affairs
Corporatist states
Governments in which various factions are part of state entities that determined social policy
Social democratic states
States with relatively high taxes that are used to pay for generous social services
Feminist movement
Social movement aimed at improving the status of women and reducing gender-based discrimination
Serfdom
Practice in which peasants were legally attached to estates and served the landowning nobility
Biases
Inclinations or prejudices for or against something
Positive sociology
Analysis attempts to be fact-based and objective
Normative analysis
Analysis attempts to judge whether policies are good or bad
Institutional politics
Influencing politics in official and sanctioned ways
Contentious politics
Efforts to influence politics outside of the official and accepted system.
Grassroots
Structure where control of a social movement is local, and members don’t answer to a central leadership.
Social movement sector
Individuals and organizations that organize protests and work to change public opinion on issues.
Social movement outcomes
Effects of social movement efforts
Authoritarianism
Governing style that relies on strict obedience to leaders.
Nationalism
Belief that governments should put national interests first by closing borders and waging trade wars.
Family
A group connected by blood, sexual relationship, or the law
Marriage
Socially-sanctioned union that includes rights and responsibilities of the spouses to each other, their children, and the larger society.
Adoption
Process of parents voluntarily choosing to have a legal parent-child relationship with a child that is not related by blood.
Blended family
Family with a step-parent, step-sibling or half-sibling
Matrilineal society
Determines kinship, names, property, and titles through the female line.
Patrilineal society
Determines kinship, names, property, and titles through the male line.
Universal norm
A norm that exists in virtually every society
Incest taboo
Cultural prohibition against sexual relations between people who are related to one another.
Longitudinal data
Data gathered at different points in time
Polygamy
Having multiple spouses at the same time
Polygyny
One man has multiple wives at the same time
Polyandry
One woman has multiple husbands at the same time
Nuclear family
The idealistic breadwinner/homemaker married couple and their dependent children
May-December relationship
Relationship in which there is a large age gap between partners
Companionate affection
Deep emotional commitment
Divorce
Legally-recognized termination of a marriage
No-fault divorce
marriage dissolutions in which neither spouse is required to prove the fault of the other
Gray divorce
Divorce over the age of 50
Social integration
Degree to which people in a community have connections to one another’s daily lives.
Double standard for sexual behavior
Women are judged more harshly than men are for the same sexual behavior
Cohabitation revolution
Growth in number of couples living together instead of getting married.
Cohabitation effect
Phenomenon in which couples who cohabit before marriage are more likely to divorce.
Wedding industrial complex
Merging of capitalist industries with social and cultural marriage rituals.
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