Elements of Social Structure and Individual Interaction
Introduction to Social Structure
Definition and Framework: Social structure represents the framework of a society, organizing the way it is built and how individuals within it interact. It guides language, symbols, values, and interaction.
Building Analogy: The structure of society can be compared to a high-rise building:
Floors: Represent different social institutions (e.g., economy, politics, family).
Sub-areas (Offices/Apartments/Condos): Represent groups within these institutions, such as different types of families.
Foundational Floors: The family is often considered a foundational floor, serving as the first agent of socialization.
Higher Floors: Politics might be positioned higher as it guides and regulates other levels.
Interconnectedness and Integrity: For a society to function, all institutions (floors) must maintain their integrity. If one collapses, the whole building tilts or falls.
Example of Connectivity: The economic structure influences business success, which impacts tax collection. Taxes pay for government services, which in turn provide fire protection, policing, transportation, and roads.
Biological Analogy: Social structure is also likened to the bones of the human body. Breaking a bone (e.g., a leg or sprained ankle) affects the individual's mobility but also requires the use of crutches and impacts the lives of those around them, requiring adjustments in various social components to maintain structure.
The Four Aspects of Social Structure
Sociology identifies four primary elements that comprise social structure. This lecture focuses specifically on the first two:
Statuses: Positions within the social structure.
Roles: The behaviors associated with those positions.
Groups: To be discussed in subsequent sessions.
Institutions: Broad areas like deviancy, family, and politics that structure social life.
Statuses: Positions in the Social Structure
Definition: A status is a specific position an individual occupies within the social structure (e.g., student, son, daughter, parent, employee).
Inherent Meaning: Positions have no inherent meaning by themselves; their meaning is derived from cultural roles and expectations.
Cross-Cultural Differences:
Student in Asia: In some Asian cultures, it is considered rude to approach or talk to a professor directly in the classroom; students do not raise hands or ask questions.
Student in the USA: In the United States, students may be more informal, using first names for teachers or even using phones during class.
The Status Set: This refers to all the various statuses an individual holds at any given time (e.g., being a student, an employee, a sports participant, and a spouse simultaneously).
Fluidity of Statuses: Statuses are not necessarily permanent. For example, the status of "student" is removed upon graduation, while new statuses like "parent" or "spouse" may be added later in life.
Types of Statuses: Ascribed vs. Achieved
Ascribed Status
Definition: A position that an individual has no control over, typically assigned at birth.
Examples:
Race: A social construct assigned at birth.
Birth-Assigned Sex: Typically viewed as a binary, though intersex individuals are noted.
Non-Birth Examples: Ascribed status can occur later in life through no fault of the individual.
Hypothetical Scenario: An individual driving through a green light from now, following all laws, is hit by someone running a red light. If the accident leaves the individual in a wheelchair for the rest of their life, their new status as a paraplegic is an ascribed status.
Achieved Status
Definition: A position attained through an individual's own efforts, choices, or achievements.
Examples:
College Student/Graduate: Attained through the effort of education.
Spouse/Parent: Attained through the choice to marry or have children.
Ambiguity of Parenting: While procreation is a biological process, sociology treats it as an achieved status because it involves the choice to engage in intimacy or the decision to raise a child. Not everyone is able to, or chooses to, have children.
Master Status
Definition: The most important status in an individual's status set at a given time. It is the status that the individual defines as superseding all others.
Individual Definition: The master status is defined by the individual, not necessarily by how others perceive them.
Anecdote: The Biker vs. the Professor:
The speaker enjoys riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle, wears leathers, and has hair past the middle of his back.
In gas stations, parents may perceive his master status as "outlaw biker" and pull their children away.
When he mentions he is a doctor and professor at Arizona State University, their perception of his master status shifts to "professor," and they treat him with deference.
However, neither of these is his master status. The speaker defines his master status as being a parent, specifically a single father who raised children (now aged , , and when he began) entirely by himself.
Trade-offs: Master status dictates priorities. For the speaker, being a parent meant selling his first Harley Davidson to pay for the birth of his child when he was a student with no insurance.
Roles: Expected Behaviors
Definition: A role is the set of expected behaviors, obligations, and privileges attached to a status.
Relationship to Status: While statuses are often similar across cultures, the roles associated with them shift based on cultural values, language, and symbols.
Stereotypes in Roles:
The Student Role: Expectations include studying and taking exams, but also negative stereotypes like trashing apartments or underage drinking. This can lead to discrimination, such as students needing parents to co-sign leases or paying higher security deposits.
The Homeless Role: When people hear the status "homeless," they often visualize a dirty, unwashed addict. However, the "new face" of homelessness in the United States over the last decade has been single mothers with children.
Role Conflict and Role Strain
Role Conflict: Occurs when there is a conflict between the expected behaviors of two or more different statuses.
Example: A police officer catches her own son using drugs. The role of "mother" dictates protecting the child, while the role of "police officer" dictates making an arrest.
Role Strain: Occurs when there is tension or difficulty in fulfilling the roles within a single status.
Example 1: The Manager: A manager cares for her employees' personal issues (illness, family deaths) but is also pressured by superiors to accomplish tasks. Juggling these competing demands within the single status of "manager" causes strain.
Example 2: The Mother: A mother with two children has talented shows on the same night at different schools. Trying to be in two places at once for both children causes role strain.
Social Predictability and Ethnomethodology
Function of Predictability: Shared understanding of statuses and roles provides a sense of safety and stability.
Example: Driving is possible because of shared symbols like red and green lights. On Arizona freeways, drivers travel at or safely because everyone follows the unwritten rule of staying in lanes and understanding the fast/slow lane distinction.
Culture Shock: Occurs when one enters a society where the statuses and roles are unfamiliar, leading to insecurity.
Ethnomethodology: The study of how people use background assumptions to make sense out of life.
Breaching Experiments: Sociologists purposefully violate social rules to observe reactions and study social order.
Elevator Rules: Unwritten rules in the US include: push only one button, walk to the back, face the front, and avoid eye contact (often by looking at a phone or a watch). Pushing all the buttons or facing the back of the elevator violates these norms and causes others to "freak out."
Dramaturgical Analysis: The Presentation of Self
Founding Concept: Developed by Erving Goffman, this perspective views social interaction as a theatrical performance (Dramaturgy).
The Stage: Following Shakespeare's idea that "all the world's a stage," individuals play roles based on cultural scripts.
Components of the Performance:
Props: Tools used to establish status (e.g., a student's backpack, a doctor's stethoscope or lab coat, a police officer's uniform).
Scripts: Different ways of communicating depending on the audience (e.g., talking differently to parents vs. friends vs. employers).
Stage Regions:
Front Stage: Where the performance is given (the presented self).
Back Stage: Where the individual can retreat and be their "true self."
The Sick Role: An example of performance. Even if slightly recovering, a person might exaggerate a cough during a doctor's visit to prove they weren't faking.
The "Calling in Sick" Performance: Individuals often use specific voice inflections and feigned coughs when calling an employer to play the part of a sick person convincingly.
Summary of Social Interaction
Socialization: According to George Herbert Mead, socialization is the process of learning these roles and statuses, allowing for commonality in social structure.
Connection: Every status and role influences others. For example, political rulings on international students can impact the economics of a school, the size of classrooms, and the ability to teach. Understanding these connections is the core of the sociological perspective.