Sociology: Foundations, Theories, Institutions, Culture, and Deviance

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering classical and modern sociological theories, modes of thought, institutional structures, culture, socialization, and the sociology of deviance based on lecture notes.

Thin Slicing

The use of nonverbal cues to form rapid first impressions of others.

Sociological Imagination

The capacity to shift from one perspective to another, enabling an understanding of the larger historical scene and how individual life intersects with societal history.

Infodemic

The rapid spread of bad, false, or misleading information across social media.

Pink Tax

The practice of charging higher prices for products and services marketed toward women.

Intersectionality

A theoretical approach analyzing how multiple overlapping social identities (such as race, gender, and class) intersect to heighten experiences of discrimination or privilege.

Disproportionate Representation

A statistical situation in which a specific group is represented in an unusually large or small proportion relative to their numbers in the general population.

Acts of Translation

The practice of adapting and interpreting ideas, concepts, and values between different cultures and languages.

Protestant (Work) Ethic

A set of values emphasizing hard work, discipline, and frugality, which Max Weber identified as a major contributor to the rise of capitalism.

Survival of the Fittest

A term coined by Herbert Spencer applying natural selection to human societies, suggesting that those best adapted to their social environment survive and prosper.

Social Facts

Patterns of action, values, and institutions that exist external to the individual but exert social constraint and control over individual behavior (conceptualized by Émile Durkheim).

Settlement House

A community center established to provide social services and support to poor and immigrant neighborhoods, such as Jane Addams's Hull House in Chicago.

Ethnography

The systematic study of a community or culture based on direct, immersive observation and interaction.

Folk Society

A traditional, small-scale, and close-knit community governed by established customs and informal social control.

Political Economy

The study of the relationship between political institutions and economic processes.

Cultural Mosaic

A metaphor characterizing Canadian multicultural society, where diverse ethnic groups maintain their distinct cultural identities.

Melting Pot

A model of multiculturalism emphasizing the rapid assimilation of immigrants into a shared, unified national culture.

Vertical Mosaic

A societal structure in which systemic discrimination arranges ethnic and cultural groups into an enduring hierarchy of wealth and power.

Standpoint Theory

The view that knowledge, perspective, and understanding are developed directly from an individual's specific living situation and social position.

Institutional Ethnography

A research method that examines how institutional rules and practices coordinate and shape everyday life, rejecting the possibility of a neutral stance.

Stasis

The way in which social institutions and structures manage to remain stable and largely unchanged over time.

Kinesis

The mechanisms and processes explaining how and why societies change over time.

Methodological Individualism (Atomism)

The theoretical perspective asserting that 'the social' is simply a collection or aggregate of individual behaviors and actions.

Structural Functionalism

A theoretical paradigm that views society as a complex system of interconnected parts working together to promote stability, order, and social integration.

Symbolic Interactionism

A micro-level theoretical perspective focusing on how shared meanings, symbols, and communication are constructed through daily interpersonal interactions.

Verstehen

A deep, empathetic understanding of social phenomena achieved through seeing action from the perspective of the actor while maintaining mental distancing.

Subaltern

A marginalized, oppressed, or powerless group within a social order.

Critical Sociology

An approach that aligns professional sociology with its historical mission of moral critique and social reform, preventing researchers from losing sight of goals of inquiry.

Policy Sociology

The production of sociological data and research for governments and large corporations to formulate rules, regulations, and legislation.

Public Sociology

The practice of using sociological ideas and research to address public issues and engage directly with members of society.

Traditional Authority

Authority legitimized by long-standing customs, traditional practices, or beliefs in divine will.

Premodern Thought

A mode of thought characterized by supernatural sources of truth, traditional authority, and pregiven, fixed identities.

Modern Thought

A mode of thought rooted in science as the source of truth, rational-legal authority, discoverable identities, and the belief that societies can be rationally planned and improved.

Postmodern Thought

A mode of thought rejecting absolute truth in favor of multiple partial truths, denying universal progress, recognizing no ultimate authority, and seeing identity as continuously in flux.

Rationalization

The historical process of replacing traditional rules and emotions with reason, calculation, and standardized procedures to maximize efficiency and order.

Disenchantment of the World

The loss of magic, mysticism, and wonder in everyday life resulting from the rise of rationalization and scientific thought.

McDonaldization

The process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant (efficiency, predictability, calculability, and control) come to dominate social institutions and daily life.

Social Organization

A formal, structured entity established to coordinate groups of people in achieving a specific, stated objective.

Division of Labour

The breakdown of complex tasks into specialized, smaller components assigned to specific individuals.

Gig Work

A labor arrangement in which independent workers contract with companies to complete discrete, short-term tasks or jobs rather than holding steady employment.

Social Institutions

Widespread and enduring patterns of interaction, rules, and practices through which societies respond to fundamental categories of human need.

Collective Effervescence

Intense, shared emotional energy and enthusiasm that sweeps through a large group during collective gatherings.

Nuclear Family

A domestic unit consisting of a married couple living with their biological children.

Multigenerational Family

A household arrangement in which three or more generations live together or remain closely connected.

Ideologies

Shared systems of ideas, values, and beliefs concerning how society and human life should be organized.

Social Structure

The overarching framework and collection of social institutions that organize and govern life in a given society.

Structural Position

An individual's location within the social structure that determines their specific distribution of opportunities, resources, and constraints.

Egoistic Suicide

Suicide resulting from inadequate social integration, where an individual feels detached, isolated, or alienated from society.

Altruistic Suicide

Suicide resulting from excessive social integration, where the individual's life is subordinate to the demands and values of the collective group.

Fatalistic Suicide

Suicide resulting from excessive social regulation, where extreme rules, control, and oppression leave an individual with virtually no personal freedom.

Anomic Suicide

Suicide caused by insufficient social regulation, occurring when rapid social or economic upheavals destroy stability and standard expectations.

Institutional Discrimination

Widespread and institutionalized practices that systematically disadvantage certain groups while providing advantages to others.

Social Stratification

The systematic and persistent categorization of individuals and groups into enduring hierarchical layers of privilege and power.

Social Construction

An understanding, concept, or feature of reality that is created, maintained, and shared by social interaction rather than being biologically fixed or natural.

Culture

The shared beliefs, values, behaviors, norms, symbols, objects, and customs that characterize a society and shape its members' worldview.

Socialization

The lifelong process through which individuals learn the values, norms, skills, and roles necessary to participate effectively in their society.

Ethnocentrism

The tendency to judge other cultures by the standards of one's own culture, typically assuming one's own cultural practices are superior.

Culture Wars

Social and political conflicts between differing groups over cultural values, moral beliefs, and the rules governing societal life.

Deviance

Behaviors, beliefs, or traits that depart from established social expectations and attract negative social reactions.

Criminal Deviance

A specific category of deviant behavior that violates codified laws and is subject to formal legal sanctions.

Strain Theory

Robert K. Merton's theory stating that deviance emerges when societies emphasize common cultural goals but fail to provide legitimate institutionalized means for everyone to attain them.

Differential Association Theory

Edwin Sutherland's theory proposing that criminal and deviant behavior is learned through social interaction and communication with intimate personal groups.

Social Disorganization Theory

A sociological perspective asserting that crime and deviance are shaped by the physical, economic, and organizational breakdown of the local living environment.

Neutralization Theory

A theory demonstrating how individuals employ cognitive justifications or excuses to convince themselves that breaking a social rule is permissible.

Labeling Theory

The theory that deviance is not inherent to an act, but results from social judgments and the application of labels that alter a person's self-concept and social treatment.

Primary Deviance

The initial, isolated act of norm-breaking that occurs before an individual is publicly stigmatized or labeled as deviant.

Secondary Deviance

Deviant behavior that occurs after an individual accepts a deviant label, largely as an adaptation to the negative reactions and treatment of others.

Collective Conscience

The totality of shared beliefs, sentiments, and moral values common to members of a society, which defines right and wrong.

Anomie

A condition of normlessness in which social rules and standards break down, leaving individuals feeling disconnected and lacking moral guidance.

Stigmatization

The social process by which a specific attribute, identity, or condition is marked as discreditable, socially devalued, and spoiled.

Medicalization

The process whereby non-medical behaviors, conditions, or personal problems become defined, categorized, and treated as medical disorders or illnesses.

Double Consciousness

A concept introduced by W.E.B. Du Bois describing the internal conflict experienced by marginalized or colonized people forced to view themselves through the perspective of the dominant group.

Thomas Theorem

A sociological principle formulated by W.I. Thomas and Dorothy Swaine Thomas stating that 'if men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.'