Social theory final

   Explain how the id, ego, and superego interact in Freud’s theory of personality development, and discuss how this developmental process brings the individual into conformity with societal expectations.

• The id (latin for it) represents the human basic instinctual drive, which is considered unconscious 

• The ego (latin for I) represents a person's conscious efforts to balance the innate pleasure seeking drives and the regulations of society 

• The super ego (latin for above or beyond the ego) represents the person's internalized values and norms. Simply put, it represents the conscience. 

• humankind transcends its animality by undergoing a basic change from primary process ruled by the unconscious system (id) to the secondary process dominated by the conscious system (ego) 

Personality development

• If the ego successfully manages the opposing forces of the id and the superego, the personality is considered to be well adjusted. If this conflict is not successfully resolved, personality disorders can result.

• Freud views childhood as the critical period for the information of an individual's basic personality, and he believes that conflicts experienced during this early stage of life often linger as an unconscious source of personality problems in adult life. 

• Freud believed that personality developed through a series of childhood stages in which the pleasure seeking energies of the id become focused on certain erogenous areas - areas of the body that are particularly sensitive to stimulation

The three stages of psychosexual development

• Oral stage - age birth to 1 year. Erogenous zone: mouth 

• Anal stage - age 1-3. Erogenous zone: genitals 

• Latent stage - age 6 - puberty. Erogenous zone: sexual feelings are inactive 

• Genital stage - age puberty to death. Erogenous zone: maturing sexual interests. 

 Explain the central theme of Talcott Parsons’s theory of social action and identify what AGIL represents in his functional analysis of societal integration.

• Grand functional theory views the social system as a whole or as the great social organism that operates on various functional organs (sectors) and suborgans (subsectors)

• Social action involves unit act (need - disposition) and functions through the organismic system of adaptation (a)  to make three subsystems functioning 

• Three subsystems are: personality system (goal attainment), social system (integration), and cultural system (latency)

How parsons agil framework operates 

• Adaptation (A) - the system must adapt to its environment and secure the necessary resources for survival. This is primarily an economic function (economy) - Organic system 

• Goal attainment (G) - the system must set and achieve collective goals, usually managed through political and policy making institutions (government) - Personality system 

• Integration (I) - the system must maintain cohesion and solidarity / unity, ensuring that its different parts work together often by enforcing institutions such as laws - Social system 

• Latency (L) - the system must maintain and renew cultural patterns, values, and motivation generations. This is often associated with socialization institutions like family, education, and religion. - Cultural system 

Agil explains how society stays stable: it adapts, sets goals, ensures integration/cohesion, and passes on cultural values

Also identify Parsons’s Pattern Variables and explain how they distinguish traditional from modern societies.

“Pattern variables” are often used to compare traditional society vs modern society.

• Affectivity vs affective neutrality - emotion based interactions (family- based decisions, personal loyalty) vs rational, emotionless interactions (professional and bureaucratic relationships) 

• Collectivity orientation vs self orientation - group or community focused actions (kinship based obligations) vs individual centered action (personal ambition, career success) 

• Particularism vs universalism - social relations based on specific relationships (family ties, local custom) vs impersonal rules applied to all (legal system, meritocracy) 

• Ascription vs achievement - status based on birth, family, caste, or tradition vs status based on individual achievements, education, or skill 

• Diffuseness vs specificity - relationships are role specific (farmer and landlord, master and apprentice) vs relationships are more flexible and multi faceted (networking, multiple roles in society) 

Traditional - Social life is rooted in kinship, inherited roles, emotional ties, and group obligation.

Modern - Social life is more bureaucratic, merit-based, rational, and oriented toward individualism and formal roles.

Distinguish Merton's concepts of "manifest function" and "latent function" and use examples to illustrate their differences in social consequences.

• Manifest function and latent function 

• Manifest -Manifest functions are the intended consequences of an action or institution.

• Latent -Latent functions are the unintended consequences that often have powerful social effects.

examples

• The manifest function of anti gambling legislation may be to suppress gambling its latent function to create an illegal empire for the gambling syndicates 

• Christian missions in parts of african manifestly tried to covert africans to christianity, latently helped destroy the indigenous tribal cultures and this provided an important impetus towards rapid social transformation

  Explain Merton’s goal-means inconsistency perspective in terms of how structural strain gives rise to deviant behavior.

• Goal means strain, system dysfunction and deviance 

• Robert k merton borrowed durkheims concept of anomie – the breakdown of the normative system – to form his own theory called strain theory 

• It differs somewhat from durkheims in that merton argued that the real problem is not created by a sudden social change, as durkheim proposed but rather by a social structure that holds out the same goals to all its members without giving them equal means to achieve them. It is this lack of integration between what the culture calls for and what the structure permits that causes deviant behavior. Deviance then is a symptom of the social structure 

 Identify and explain the key concepts of three contemporary conflict theories—Dahrendorf’s Imperatively Coordinated Associations (ICAs), Mills’s Power Elite, and Collins’s macro–micro link in conflicts over material, organizational, and symbolic resources—as discussed in class.

Imperatively coordinated associations - Ralf Dahrendorf modernized conflict theory by arguing that authority, not simply ownership of property, is the central basis of social conflict in modern societies.

• ICA = groups structured by authority relations (superordinate vs. subordinate).
  
  

• Conflict emerges from authority, not property (revises Marx).
  
  

• Society is a mix of associations where power is unequally distributed.

Powe elite - Wright Mills argued that power in the United States is concentrated in a small, interconnected elite that dominates major institutions.

• Mills’s power elite = top leaders of government, military, and corporations forming a unified political and economic ruling class.
  
  

• They share interests, circulate between institutions, and control major decisions.

• Like governments military corporations 

Macro-micro - Randall Collins emphasized that conflict operates simultaneously at macro (large-scale institutional) and micro (everyday interaction) levels. He explained conflict in terms of competition for three major types of resources: Material, organizational, symbolic/cultural

• Macro structural perspective: structural situation in which individuals bargain with one another under the guidance of certain normative structure. Here markets are one of a kind of exchange situation and networks are another kind of exchange situation. (for example dating, sexual and marriage, business deals)

• Micro behavioral and relational perspective: individual rational choice: the cost/benefit calculations of individuals, emphasizing how individuals see to maximize rewards and minimize costs. 

Macro level: structural perspective on social exchange: claude levi strauss

• Influenced by durkheim and mauss, levi strauss emphasizes exchange functions in that exchange must be viewed by its functions for integrating the larger social structure, and therefore the forces compelling reciprocity are stemming from society itself as it is groups that set the norms of exchange and bound themselves by moral obligations. 

 Identify and understand Marx and Weber’s influences on contemporary conflict theoretical development regarding power, inequality, and societal stratification.

Marxs influence on the feminist perspective of conflict theory 

• Preserving the emancipatory dimension of marxist theory with a focus on gender and patriarchy as the primary sources of oppression and inequality. Feminist theory is generally aimed at examining the construction of gender and sex roles in modern society to demonstrate the existence of a female world that sociology had hitherto ignored. 

• class based on means of production

• economic control

• ruling class shapes ideology to legitimize inequality.

• power structure, class conflict, and exploitation

Weber

•  power from class, status and party

  Identify three prominent feminist theories and understand the central idea of each theory, such as Dorothy Smith’s Standpoint Theory or Institutional Ethnography, Judith Butler’s Queer Theory, and Patricia Hill Collins’s Black Feminist Thought.

Contemporary well known feminist theorists

• Dorothy smith - standpoint (as in her “the everyday world as problematic: a feminist sociological theory 1987) or “institutional ethnography (as in her “institutional ethnography: a sociological for people, 2005”)  focuses on how knowledge and social relations are structured by power dynamics, particularly revolving around sex and gender.

• Judith P. Butler - in her “gender trouble” (1990) she makes a significant contribution to queer theory and views gender identity are not binary (male/female) or fixed but instead a fluid, socially constructed phenomenon, emphasizing the performative nature of gender which means gender is constructed through cultural expectations rather than innate characteristics 

• Patricia Hill Collins - in her “block feminist thought” (1990) focuses on bringing attention to the unique experiences of African American women while also addressing the intersections between race, gender, and class in shaping experiences of oppression, power, and inequality.

  Identify and understand W.E.B. Du Bois’s concepts of “Double Consciousness” and “Veil” in his theory of race and racism.

• One of pioneering theorists of race and racism is W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963)

• His “the souls of black folk”, published 1903, draws on Du Bois own experience of growing up black in a white nation to illustrate the psycho socio effects of racism

• Du Bois puts forth two concepts that have become staples of sociology and race theory “double consciousness” and “the veil”

Du Bois “double consciousness” and “the veil”

• Double consciousness refers to the psychological experience of living with two conflicting identities (as a black individual and as an American citizen in the US)

• Du Bois likens this experience to being “born with a veil” where the veil represents the separation between the black and white worlds. The veil symbolizes the racial divide and the barriers that separate african americans from full participation in american society.

Identify the two distinctive features of Frankfurt School Critical Theory, specifying which feature continues the Marxian tradition and which revises Marx’s economy-centered perspective, as discussed in class.

Continues marxian tradition -

• The frankfurt school maintains marxs concept on praxis - an interplay between theoretical understanding and social action. The essence of praxis is that theory must be used to guide social action and to stimulate action to change social conditions 

Revises marx economy centered perspective -

• The frankfurt school makes a revision on marxist critical thinking of dualism aimed at exploring the relation between consciousness and social reality. Whereas orthodox marxism is to “stand hegel on his head” the frankfurt school attempts to reverse it by putting hegel back on his feet. 

• For Marx the change in the very nature of society is driven by control of the means of material production, but for the Frankfurt school theorists such change has more to do with the control of signs and texts. In their views the world has been transformed into a sea of symbols that have lost anchorage in material conditions and therefore those signs and texts symbolize little but themselves.

   Identify and understand the key concepts of the Frankfurt School critical theory associated with Lukacs’s “reification” and Horkheimer and Adorno’s “instrumental reason.”

Reification -

• The major contributions of gyrogy lukacs: drawing upon marxs “fetishism of commodities” (commodification of social relations through money and markets) and webers rationalized modern life, lukacs employed the concept of reification to denote the process by which social relationships become objects that can be manipulated, bought, and sold. In other words social relations are coordinated by exchange values and by people's perception of one another as objects/things. For lukacs the solution to the problem of domination resides in making people more aware and conscious of their situation through detailed, historical analysis of reification.

Instrumental reason -

• The major contributions of max horkheimer and theordor adorno: both of them emphasized that humans “subjective side” is restricted by the spread of rationalization/objectification that is how the “instrumental reason” (means/ends rationality) has invaded the human spirit. They conceptualize this as a dualist process by the rationalized material objects. 

Domination of instrumental / technological rationality in modern society

• Horkheimer drew a distinction between subjective reason (formal or instrumental rationality) and objective reason (value for the ends of action and a basis for determining what is right and just - which is lost in advanced industrial society) 

  Understand Herbert Marcuse’s theory of “one-dimensional society” and explain his distinction between “technological rationality” and “individualistic rationality.”

One dimensional - Herbert marcuse in his books one dimensional man (1964) discusses how advanced industrial society leads to the suppression of critical, oppositional thinking and results in a society where individuals are absorbed into consumer culture and technological rationality 

• He argues that this creates one dimensional society with one dimensional thought by which people are unable to envision or desire alternatives to the existing order and worse individuals lose the ability to think critically and negatively about society.

distinction - 

• Marcuse emphasized the distinction between “technological rationality” and “individualistic rationality”. Like Horkheimer's objective reason, Marcuse defined "individualistic rationality as a critical and oppositional attitude toward capitalism.

• Technological rationality replaced individualistic forms of thought as the former is marked by the scientific approach to all human affairs 

• Unlike Marx, Marcuse and critical theorists did not contend that consciousness was tied to particular class position, for no one can escape the numbering effects of technological rationality. 

 Identify and understand Antonio Gramsci’s theory of “Ideological Hegemony.”

• Unlike Marx who viewed ideas as reflection of the material structure of society. Gramcis turned back to a more hegelian mode of human consciousness see ideological forces in determining material relation in society 

• Gramacis believed that the ruling class in hegemonic controlling not only property and power but ideology as well which is what he calls “ideological hegemony” the state is no longer a crude tool of coercion nor an intrusive and insensitive bureaucratic authority it has become the propagator of culture and the civic education of the population creating, and controlling key institutional systems in more unobtrusive and indirect ways.

• For gramsci the real battle in capitalist societies is over whose symbols will prevail. So who controls the state dominates symbols (text and signs)

Identify and understand Jurgen Habermas’ critical theory in terms of his concepts of “communicative action” and “public sphere.”

• Retaining Marx's emancipatory theme while reducing its revolutionary tone. Following the critical theorizing while trying to avoid the retreat into subjectivism of earlier critical theorists such as luckas, horkhiemer, and adorno.

Revision\n

• For herbs the mere critique of oppression is not enough because such critique becomes a "refined object itself”. For critique to be useful in liberating people from domination, it is necessary for the critique to touch upon the fundamental process by which society works

Solution 

• The fundamental process involves first of all the evolution of what he terms the public sphere, an arena where people can carry on free and open discussion that is resolved by rational argumentation. Communicative action is critical as well as essential in the evolution of the public sphere as Habermas sees emancipation from domination as possible through this very power of communicative action.

 Does Herbert Blumer’s statement, “It is the social process in group life that creates and upholds the rules, not the rules that create and uphold group life,” reveal the fundamental difference between symbolic interactionism and functionalism? Explain your answer.

• The social order (the patterning of individuals' interaction in social life) - is continually constructed and reconstructed through the fitting together of acts by individuals who are attempting to interpret and define the situations. 

Difference between symbolic interactionalism and functionalism

• “It is the social process in group life that creates and upholds the rules and not the rules that create and uphold group life” that joint actions, and institutions they sustain, take on repetitive and stable forms is a function not of an organization's “inner dynamics” or “system requirements” but of the recurring use of schemes of interpretation and definition.

 Identify and understand “Thomas’ Theorem” as in “the definition of situation,” Robert Park’s role-playing perspective as in “role conflict” and “role strain,” and Ralph H. Turner’s role-making perspective as in “role verification” and “folk norm of consistency.” Also understand Sheldon Stryker’s view of the self as a hierarchy of identities, organized by their relative salience.

Thomas theorem -

• “If men define the situations as real, they are real in their consequences” - william thomas (1928)

• In other words we act based on the meanings we ascribe to the situations or stimuli we confront. Thus reality itself is created through the definition of the situation.

Role playing - 

• Individuals are seen as playing roles associated with positions in larger social networks. Role is thus linked to structural positions in society.

• Individuals vocations as well as the recognition by community define their positions in society 

• Role conflict and role strain derived from statuses associated with normative expectations that affect the individuals role behavior. 

Role making - 

• Different from parks theory, interaction, according to turner is not just the role playing but rather a joint and reciprocal process of role taking and role making 

• People seek to continuously adjust responses and verify roles in accordance with newly emitted gestures and cues within the folk norm of consistency. Thus process of role verification involves a constant effort of revising the identification of the others role whenever inconsistent cues are emitted in interaction 

Hierarchy of identities - 

• His theory is centered on specifying the reciprocal relationship between self and society (which is central theme in Mead’s theory). 

• An identity is a “part” of one’s self. The number of identities a person possesses corresponds to the number of role relationships he/she participates in. 

• Self is organized according to a hierarchy of identities, and in varying situations, the identity that has the more salience or importance for the individual influences his or her behavior. 

• Identity salience often involves commitment, e.g. “he is committed to being a member of that group”. 

Understand Goffman’s theory in his dramaturgical approach and explain how the “self” is presented on “frontstage” and “backstage.”

• Dramaturgical approach – the presentation of self in everyday life – social life is built upon staging and performance. 

Goffman: Gramaturgical approach to social life – performance on front

stage and back stage in relation to audience:

Front Stage:

• An “institutionalized setting” where an actor takes on an

established role and attempt to meet with “stereotyped

expectation” from the audience (here the performer must be

in character).

Back stage: 

• In contrast to the front stage, the back region of performance normally unobserved by, and restricted from, members of the audience (here the performer can relax and step out of character). 

Self - 

• The essence of the self is found not in the interior, cognitive deliberations of individuals, but rather in interaction itself – the image of the self is dependent on the willingness of others to “go along” with the particular impression that an individual is seeking to present in different situations or “stages”. 

 Understand Goffman’s concepts of impression management and interaction order in terms of demeanor and deference as they relate to how individuals present themselves in everyday life.

Impression management -

• Impression management refers to the verbal and nonverbal practices individuals employ in an attempt to present an acceptable image of his or her self to the other (audience). That means people always attempt to present their self in the way others want to see them. 

Interaction order -

• Goffman is far less interested in exploring the internal conversations that individuals engage in as they map out their conduct (“the imaginative rehearsal of alternative conduct”). Instead, he is more interested in exploring how social arrangements and the actual, physical co-presence of individuals (“the interaction order”) shapes the organization of self. 

Demeanor and deference - 

• Rituals that structure social life. 

• A person’s demeanor (conduct, dress) and the deference (honor, dignity, respect) constitute an interaction rituals. 

• “The self is in part a ceremonial thing, a sacred object which must be treated with proper ritual care and in turn must be presented in a proper light to others…. As a means through which this self is established, the individual acts with proper demeanor while in contact with others and is treated by others with deference.”. 

Compare Goffman’s and Mead’s conceptions of the self and explain the major similarities and differences between their views?

• For mead, self is developed via socialization through three stages of individuals life: play, game, and generalized other 

• For goffman self is organized and presented through interaction order on front stage and back stage. Self is situational. 

similarity - Mead has intellectual influence on Goffman in terms of the interconnectedness between the self and social experiences (the self and society): 

• Notion 1: “we see ourselves as an object, as others see us”. 

• Notion 2: “The individual self is essentially a social construct that is rooted in our perceptions of how others will interpret and respond to our behavior”.

Differences -

• Goffman is far less interested in exploring the internal conversations that individuals engage in as they map out their conduct (“the imaginative rehearsal of alternative conduct”). Instead, he is more interested in exploring how social arrangements and the actual, physical co-presence of individuals (“the interaction order”) shapes the organization of self. 

   Understand Alfred Schutz’s phenomenological concepts of “intersubjectivity” and the “stock of common-sense knowledge at hand.”

Intersubjectivity -

• intersubjectivity, which refers to how people achieve mutual understanding and coordinate actions within the social world with the shared understanding individuals have of each other's experiences and actions. 

• The central theme is that individual experiences are not isolated, and they are influenced by their interactions with others which is conceptualized as intersubjectivity which suggests that our perception of shared meanings and interactions we have with others in a social context. 

Stock of common sense knowledge at hand - 

• Alfred Schutz (our world / reality is flimsy and taken for granted as people interact with each other based on “stock of common sense knowledge at hand” i.e. “what everyone knows”)

• life world (stock of common sense knowledge at hand) which refers to individuals navigating a world of taken for granted realities using practical knowledge and skills. 

Understand Garfinkel’s theory of ethnomethodology (or folkways) in terms of his thematic statement of ethnomethodology: “social reality is flimsy. Paradoxically, its strength comes mainly from its flimsiness. These constructions remain in place because we do not question them.”

Social order is fragile; it persists because people unquestionably follow everyday rules.

Understand and explain Hochschild’s sociology of emotions and emotion management and explain her concept of “commodification of feelings.”

• Draws from two theoretical traditions (1) organismic model (darwin and freud) in which biological factors are said to shape human emotions which are instinctual (2) the interaction model (mead, blumer, and goffman) stresses the role of social processes in shaping emotions 

• Builds on the above intellectual traditions by showing that emotions themselves are socially constructed and interpreted through interaction

• Emotions are not simply given and experienced but they are created 

• Emotion management refers to the ways individuals try to align their internal feelings with societal expectations

• Hochschild observed that people regulate their emotions to fit with social norms making adjustments to avoid feeling out of place or inappropriate. This involves a personal effort to cultivate certain feelings (like empathy or patience) or to suppress others (like anger or frustration)

Commodification of emotion (feelings)

• When our natural capacity to engage in emotional work is sold for a wage and bought to serve the profit motive, our feelings become engineered to further corporate and organizational interests. Thus emotional work becomes rationalized to better serve instrumental purposes

• Women are more susceptible to the commodification of their emotive experiences.

 Understand exchange theory as seen in George Homans’ behavioristic exchange theory, with its concepts of “elementary social behavior” and “distribution justice,” and Richard Emerson’s exchange network theory in terms of “negotiated exchange” and “reciprocal exchange.”

George homans -

• of rewards (and punishments) among interacting individuals 

• Critical of levi strauss exchange structural functionalism. Homans emphasizes face to face interaction by focusing on direct exchanges among individuals guided by psychological principles of reinforcement which he calls elementary social behavior 

• Such interaction involves giving and receiving rewards or punishments, reinforcing behaviors that are rewarded, and reducing behaviors that are not. 

Homans distributive justice 

• Each party to the exchange must perceive that they are not paying too high a cost relative to the rewards they are gaining 

• The individuals develop such sense of distributive justice through the history of their past experiences that determines his or her present expectations regarding rewards and costs

• Distributive justice refers specifically to the perceived fairness of outcomes relative inputs in social exchanges.

Richard emersons -

• Emersons exchange theory builds on principles of social exchange, emphasizing the dynamics of power and dependence within relationships / networks

• Emerson viewed exchange relationships not as isolated dyads but as embedded within larger networks of social relations. The position of an individual within a network influences their power by affecting their access to resources and alternatives.

• Negotiated exchange - in negotiated exchanges the terms discussed, agreed upon and often involve formal bargaining or negotiation between parties 

• Reciprocal exchange - in reciprocal exchanges, the exchange is informal, uncoordinated and does not involve explicit negotiation. Instead participants provide benefits with the expectation (but not guarantee) of future reciprocity. 

Distinguish Peter Blau’s concepts of “intrinsic rewards” and “extrinsic rewards,” and provide examples that illustrate the difference between the two.

• Blau attempts to explain the dynamics of exchange relations that emerge between individuals and groups as they jointly pursue their interests. Reciprocal social exchange creates trust and social bonds between people. 

Blau driven for social rewards 

• The desire for social rewards leads individuals to enter into exchange relations with one another 

• For blau social rewards extend beyond material or tangible outcomes encompassing emotional satisfaction, social integration, respect, practical help, and influence 

• These rewards are central to Blau's perspective on social exchanges shaping interpersonal relationships and broader social structures. 

Extrinsic rewards - associating with others serves as a means to a further end (e.g. a salesperson is nice because he wants to make a commission not because he values the relationships he has with any particular costumer)

Intrinsic rewards - those things we find pleasurable in and of themselves not because they provide the means for obtaining other benefits (e.g. love, friendship, family, commitment)