soc exam 3

10/18

  • look at one note on 10/4
  • deviance clarifies rules
  • deviance unites a population
  • the labeling process the deviant master status

CRIME

  • criminal justice and criminology are both branches of sociology
  • there are felonies and misdemeanor
  • conventional or street crime: violent crime and property crime (castro getting mugged at gunpoint)
  • occupational or white collar crime: illegal activities committed by people in their financial situations or through their course of employment
    • very common
  • corporate crime: illegal acts committed on behalf of the corporate or in support of the organization
    • castros example: pouring pollutant into canal bc boss said to
  • organized crime: business operations that supply illegal goods and services for profit
  • political crime: illegal or unethical acts involving the usurpation( taking power illegally) of power by government officials, or perpetrated against the government, seeking to make a statement, or to undermine the gov, and attempting to overthrow the gov.
    • most relevant to us today

RACE

  • there is only one race the human race
  • race: socially constructed categories based on shared external physical traits
  • colorism: racial discrimination in ones own community ( blacks against blacks )
  • to make someone a race ex: when walking down the street someone makes you out to be white

Why does race matter?

1: institutional source of ranking, it allows for comparison it is considered functional for society

  • it is identified by common and opposing economic interests

2: scientifically problematic

in group variance is greater than between group variance

ETHNICITY

  • ethincity: scientifically much more useful related to cultural characteristics and nationality

    • to be Jewish is a ethnicity, ethnicity remains constant
    • our national ethinicty is american
    • ethnicity is a cultural identity and a cultural ranking
    • people in an ethnic group are bound together by shared beliefs and practices

  • cultural identification, hierarchical ranking

  • people bound through shared beliefs and ritual practices

  • race is scientifically problematic concept, but important because of the “meaning” people have attributed significance to the idea as “real”

THOMAS THEOREM

  • a situation defined as real is real in its consequences

Ethnic Group Characteristics :

  1. cultural traits
  2. community among members
  3. ethnocentrism
  4. ascribed membership
  5. territorality

Racism:

  • an ideology rooted in colonialism
    • justifies explotation of resources
    • ideology: justification for a legitimation of a set of power relations
    • justifies murder and subjugation of indigenous peoples
    • justifies enslavement for profit
  • one group is superior but all others are inferior
  • racism is a belief

Dominant Group vs. Minority Group

  • minority group means subordinante
  • features of racial/ ethnic prejudice
  • dominant and minority groups are determined purely by social power
  • shanty town

PREDJUDICE

  • a negative attitude based on faulty generalizations about a racial category or group
  • garfinkel talked about pre judgement similar
  • rather than paying atttention to someone once you find out if they are a feminist etc. you already know what they are gonna say

Categorical

  • persons are judges on the basis of their membership in some group, rather than on their individual characteristics ( achievements, accomplishments, reputation, etc. )
  • once a persond group is known his or her behavioral traits are assumed to match those associated with their group

Inflexible

  • prejudgments only become prejudices only if they are not reversible when exposed to new knowledge
  • when “ friends” are members of an ethnic group viewed adversely… they serve as “exceptions to prove the rule”

Negative

  • specific traits ascribed to target groups are inferior and socially undesirable
  • this corresponds with the sense of ethnocentricity expressed by ALL ethnic groups ( regardless of their ranking in the social hierarchy

Based on stereotypes

  • stereotypes: faulty generalizations about certain categories of persons based on incomplete information

  • application of the least desirable traits of some small number with a group to the entire group

    • germans are conformists
    • jewish people are shrewd and greedy
    • blacks are lazy
    • itlaians are loud and uncouth

  • all ethnic group are ethnocentric

  • Emory Bogardus

  • Social distance: an individuals willingness to form relationships with racial or ethnics groups other than their own

10/25/2022

  • social distance scale
  • discrimination: actions that by dominate group members that harmfully impact members of subordinate racial or ethnic groups
  • sometimes discrimination is built into the system
  • structural discrimition or institutional dis, large corporations that harmfully impact subordinate groups
    • african americans make anout 20 cents less
    • women make amount 20-23 cents less
    • women are the largest minority group
    • women have less social power than men
  • native americans are the most discriminated against group in america
  • its possible to walk around and be discriminatory but keep your mouth shut and not be predjudice
  • social darwinism is still present in the united states
  • no one intends that blacks make less than whites
  • institutions are linked to favor the more powerful and protect the more powerful from the less powerful

Frustration Agreesion Hypothesis

  • when people are frustrated in their attempts to accomplish important goals and obj they will frequently respond with hostility and aggression towards a scape goat or a scape goat group
    • being blamed for things that are not their fault
    • scape goat: someone who is blamed for things that they didn’t do, someone is incapable of resisting the hostility or aggression of others
  • BILLY BOB EXAMPLE
  • authoritarian demands hihgh level of authority and must be told what to do
  • authoritarians tend to be prejudice

Reference group theory

  • people tend to take on the attitudes of the groups with whom they most closely identify (differential association)
  • we learn from others, example racist parents

sutherland: long contact with deviant people cause you to become deviant

  • racism is learned

marx says that we arae being fracitonalized, racism is persitent becasue the eilte capatilist keep it that way

GERHARD LENSKI

there is a hierarchy of wthinic groups

anglo- white of european descent

the electorate

11/3/2022

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

physical prowess: the ability to control others physically

  • this is what the hunter gatherer groups were based on

we are in pursuit of pecuniary prowess: skill with money

we use status symbols to demonstrate to others our pecuniary prowess

  • example getting a lexus vs a toyota

consciptuous conumption: only two people in a 4000 square foot house

  • thorstein veblen
    • from physical to picuniary prowess

Social stratification: the hierarchical arrangement of social groups based on their access to and or control over valued resources

  • stratificcation is a cultural universal
    • durkeim says these are functional and somehow serve a purpose
  • to stratify something is to break it into multiple layers
  • open vs close system
    • open system allows for vertical mobility a closed system does not

middle class slide: owning ones own home etc. many americans are falling out of range of being able to do so. middle class is skrinking

vertical: movement from one layer to another in a asocial stratification system

  • moving from one social class to another
  • most people end up in the same social class as they start in
  • from a functionalist perspective education is an elevator fro upward vertical social mobility

horizontal mobility

  • vertical is one layer ot anohter
  • horiontal is moving about the same layer
    • moevemtn within the same social stratum

intra generational social mobility: occurs within one persons life

inter genereational social mobility: involves that of ones family

least humane form of social stratification is slavery it is a closed system and makes movement virtually impossible

11/8/2022

Video in moodle

Wealth Inequity

  • bottom 40 percent of americans have barely any wealth
  • the top has way more than what we think they should have
  • 1 percent of has 40 percent of americas wealth
  • 50 percent owned by top

social inequaltity is greatest in the united states versus any other first world industrialized country

  • people who are poorer have shorter life expectancies

    • bc they are at greater risk for chronic illness and disease

  • poorer people are more susceptible to HIV

  • a persons economic status coorelates to thier health

  • food desert: there are no grocery stores, there is no easy access to a healthy diet

  • poorer people have a worse diet and worse nutrition

  • healthcare is a commodity

  • if you get sick you could go bankrupt in the united states

  • heatlhcare and nutrition are adversely affected by money

  • housing is expensive

  • 66000 homeless are veterans

  • education and life chances are directly linked

  • life chances comes from max weber

  • if you are born into a wealthy family there isn’t going to be a problem to send you to an ivy league

  • functionalist say that education is an elevator

  • conflict theorist are highly critical, in this instance a conflict theorist says education contributes to different social inequality, there are different trajectories depending on the level of education that you receive

  • many people that live in the us with a full time job live in poverty

  • poverty line: the minimum amt of money required to maintain sustainance

  • the line is established by the us government and most sociologists disagree and say the line should be higher

  • absolute poverty: unable to meet ones needs and necessities

  • relative poverty: being able to meet your basic needs but not being able to live a normal lifestyle

  • the age gorup most likely to be counting the poor is children

  • one in three children are likely to experience food insecuity]

  • old women are twice as likely to be less poor than old men

  • old blacks and mexicans are most likely to live under the poverty line

  • about 2/3 of adults that live in poverty are women

  • feminization of poverty: progressive overrepresentaion of women who are poor

  • the vast majority of food stamp reciptients are white

  • low wages

  • minimum wage is not a living wage

  • half of all families who live in poverty are headed by someone is employed

  • wages increase much more slowly than prices

Davis Moore theory

social inequality is functional for society

all societies have certain tasks and positions that must be fulfilled and accomplished

  • some positions are more important for society well being than other

  • the most important positions require scarce talent as well as extensive education and training

  • the most important positions must be filled by the most qualified people

  • the positions must be functionally unique

  • the most important positions need to be the most highly rewarded

  • the population keeps growing because of a decrease in mortality

  • demography: size of population and distrobuiton

  • 7.9 billion

  • each of us leaves a carbon footprint

  • lower tfr in industrialized countries

  • \

overpopulation is something that capitalist encourage

  • the neomalthusians grew the ZPG theory from the ecology movement and out of that multiple things grew
  • it was an issue not because of starvation but because of the damage it would do to the planet
  • we are living in a period of exponential growth
  • zpg: same number of births and deaths
    • encourages max of 2 children
  • they created the zpg movement
  • demographic transition thoery
  • \
    • a shift from small pre industrial populations with high birth and death rates, to very large industrialized populations with high birth and death rates to very large industrialzed populations with low birth and death rates
  • mortality is reduced significantly due to industrialization
  • initially fertility reamins high, but then mortality begins to fall
  • for sociaoligy its predicatble population changes

4 stages of demographic transistion

1: population remains stable there is little if any population growth

2: cdr falls sharply but the cbr remains high

3: industrial stage: cbr begins to drop and fertility drops population growth goes up and goes faster, and the dbr begins to flatten out

4: fertility and mortality rates stabilize at low levels with large population, the population is flat there is no poulations growth it is neglgible of any

  • it is very accurate in describing population growth in europe

  • not all countries go through this process in the same way

  • some nations are stuck in stage 2

  • underdeveopled and developed nations are caught

  • sub saharan africa

  • there are 4 stages and we should know what happens in each stage

  • how to read a population pyramid

    • youthful and aging population
    • youth: broad bottom; underdeveopled nation

  • industrialized nations have a lower fertility rate

  • sub saharan africa is having a population boom

  • A lot of Africa is land locked

  • before better technolyg and medicine the birht and death rate remaine realtively equal now there are more staying alive thus the population boom

Population Pyramid

  • india is a young population
  • aging populations are found in
  • egg shaped pyramid is from a developed country and is an aging or aged population dependent on where the thickness is

demographic transistion theory

theory thatthe red words then blue words

  • stage 3 pop continues to grow but slows down
    • cdr and cbr become parallel again

population growth is virtually negligible

  • demographic transiiton works fine for understanding inudstrializde nations however many developeing and underdeveopling nations are stuck in stage 2
  • explanation for population boom
    • many are stuck in stage 2
    • \

11/22/2022

power:

  • capability to schieve ones goals despite the oppostition of others.
  • The ability to cause others to behave in ways other than they would have otherwise.
  • Ability to manipulate, direct, and or control others
  • power can be illegimate (coersion)
  • power can be legitimate ( authority) aka police
    • traditional authority aka monarchy
    • charm- charismatic
    • george bush
    • clinton was anti charasmatic
    • rational legal authority democracy aka voting

Competing models of power in us society

  • fundamentally opposite but complimentary

  Pluralist Model (linked to functionalism)

  • power is widely distributed between special interesr groups and lobbyist orgnizations
    • Power Elite Model
  • c wright mills
  • power i highly concentrated in the hands of a small number of global industrialists
  • conflict theory
  • mills straight up said he was marxist

Pluralist Model

  • political activity and participation by the public is minimal
  • public and priivate group interests are represented by lobby organizations called “pressure groups”

Lobby

  • to seek to assert influence on political decision making processes through personal persuasive techniques
    • job is to persuade politicians
    • meals, vacations, gifts, and promises of campaign donations and support

Political Action Commitee

  • organization designed to provide support for a p

  • issue specific

  • no single group

  • NRA

1 percent controls 40 percent

the top one tenth control most of that 40 percent

there are 3 levels of power

the power elite: the level of power above the government ex federal reserve

the government: army navy marines etc.

the mass public: us; we think of the government as the all powerful

11/29/2022

  • politics is the forum for the legitimate acquisition administrative of power
  • the process by which legal and economic power are acquired and realized through action
  • politics=power=money
  • max weber slide
  • traditionally auhtority is associated iwth a monarchy
  • chariamatic is thorgh someone charm
  • rational is laws
  • boht parties get money from corporate contributions
  • \