Sociology

  1. Social solidarity
    1. The degree to which group members share beliefs and values.

    2. The intensity and frequency of their interaction.
  2. Social structures
    Are relatively stable patterns of social relations.

    > Personal problems are explained by the social structure
  3. Microstructures
    Are the patterns of relatively intimate social relations formed during face-to-face interaction.

    > Families, friendship circle & work associations.
  4. Macrostructures
    Are overarching patterns of social relations that lie outside and above your circle of intimates and acquaitances.


    > Classes, bureaucracies and power systems such as patriarchy.
  5. Patriarchy
    Is the traditional system of economic and political inequality between women and men.
  6. Global structures
    Are patterns of social relations that lie outside and above the national level.

    > International organizations, patterns of worldwide travel and communication, and the economic relations between countries.
  7. Sociological imagination
    Is the quality of mind that enables a person to see the connection between personal troubles and social structures.
  8. Scientific Revolution
    Began about 1550.

    It encouraged the view that sound conclusions about the working society must be based on solid evidence, not just on speculations.
  9. Democratic Revolution
    Began about 1750.

    It suggested that people are responsible for organizing society and that human intervention can therefore solve social problems.
  10. Industrial Revoltion
    Oftenregarded as the most important event in world history  since the development of agriculture and cities, refers to the RAPID economic transformation that began in Britain in the 1780s.

    It involved the large-scale application of science and techonology to industrial processes, the creation of factories, and the formation of a working class.
  11. Who coined the term sociology?
    Aguste Comte (1838)

    Comte tried to place the study of society on scientific foundations. He wanted to understand the social world as it was, not as he or anyone else imagined who it should be.

    > Comte never conducted any research; neither the second founder of sociology, British social theorist HERBERT SPENCER.
  12. Theories
    Are tentative explanations of some aspect of social life that state how and why certain facts are related.
  13. Research
    Is the PROCESS of carefully observing reality to assess the validity of a theory.
  14. Values
    Are ideas about what is right and wrong.
  15. Functinoalism
    Stresses that human behaviour is governed by relatively stabnle social structure.

    It underlines how social structures maintain or undermine social stability.

    Emphasizes thtat social structures are based mainly on shared values and preferences.

    Suggests that re-stablishing equilibrium can best solve most social problems.
  16. What is sociology?
    It is a Science that constructs theories about social relationships making up a society.
  17. What are Characteristics of Sociology?
    • Holism
    • Theory Building Intellectual
    • Primacy Sense Evidence
    • Social Focus
    • Sociological imagination (historical, anthropological, critical)
  18. What is Sociological Activity?
    - Study of socially relevant phenomenon

    - Specification of variation in the phenomenon

    - Explanation of that variation
  19. Progress in every branch of knowledge goes through three stages:
    1. Theological

    2. Metaphysical

    3. Positive
  20. Functionalism...
    Social structure is based on shared values

    • Human behaviour is shaped by the social
    • structure

    Society is in a state of equilibrium

    • Key terms: manifest function, latent function
    • and dysfunction
  21. What are Key sociological Theories?
    Tentative explanations.

    - functionalism

    - conflic theory

    - symbolic interactionism

    - feminism
  22. What roles do values play in sociology?
  23. What is social research?
  24. FUNCTIONALISM
    1. Human behaviouyr is governed by relatively stable patterns of social relations or social structures.

    2. Show how social structures maintain or undermine social stability.

    3. Emphasize that social structures are based mainly on shared values or preferences.

    4. Re-establiishing equilibrium can best solve most social problems.
  25. Disfunctional consequences
    Are effects of social structures that create social instability.
  26. Manifest functions
    Are visible and intended effects of social structures.
  27. Latent functions
    Are invisible and unitended effects of social structures.
  28. Conflic theory
    - Generally focuses on large macrolevel structures and shows how major patterns of inequality in society produce social stability in some circumstances and social change in others.
  29. Conflic theory
    Society is divided into social classes

    These classes are in constant conflict; conflict between haves and have-not, powerful and powerless

    Dominant groups maintain themselves and society by force and/or ideological control

    Inequality is the source of social evils
  30. (Durkheim, Parsons, S.D. Clark (Canada))
    FUNCTIONALISM
  31. (Marx and Engels, Porter (Canada))
    CONFLIC THEORY
  32. (Weber, Mead, Goffman (Canada))
    INTERACTIONISM
  33. (Martineau, Smith and Eichler (Canada))
    FEMINISM
  34. Symbolic interactionsm
    Focus on subjective understanding of human actions and their consequences

    Emphasis on interpersonal micro level social relations

    Weber and Protestant Ethic W.I. Thomas: if people define a situation as real, it is real in its consequence
  35. Symbolic interactionism
    - Focuses on interaction in microlevel social settings and emphasizes that an adequate explanation of social behaviour requires understanding the subjective meanings people attach to their social circumstances.
  36. Protestan ethic
    Is the belief that religious doubts can be reduced, and state of grace ensured, if people work diligently and ligve ascetically.

    According to Weber, the Protestan work ethic had the unintended effect of increasing savings and investment and this stimulation capitalist growth.
  37. Social constuctionism
    Argues that apparently natural or innate features of life are often sustained by social processes that vary historically and culturally.
  38. Variant of symbolic interactionism...
    social constructionism
  39. Show that many of the presumably natural differences between women and men depend on the way power is distributed between them and the degree to which certain ideas about women and men are widely shared...
    social constructionism
  40. Feminist theory
    Claims that patriarchy is at least as important as class inequality in determining a person's opportunities in life. It hold sthat male domination and female subordination are determined not by biological necessity but by structures of power and social convention.

    It examines the operation of patriarchy in both micro and macro settings.

    And it contends that existing patterns of gender inequality can and should be changed for the benefit of all members of society.
  41. Macro. Values. How to the institutions of society contribute to social stability? A state of equilibrium.
    FUNCTIONALISM
  42. Macro. Class inequality. How do privileged groups seek to maintain their advantages and subordinate groups seek to increase theirs, often causing social change in the process? The elimination of privilege, especially class privilege.
    CONFLICT THEORY
  43. Micro. Meaning. How do individuals comunicate so as to make their social settings meaningful? Respect for the validity of minority views.
    SYMBOLIC INTERACTION
  44. Micro and macro. Patriarchy. Which social structures and interaction processes maintain male dominance and female subordination? The elimination of gender inequality.
    FEMINIST THEORY
  45. Sociologist's main task...
    Identify and explain the connection between people's personal troubles and the social structures in which people are embedded.
  46. First social thinkers to assert taht society operates according to scientific laws.
    Spencer
  47. Is the belief that all cultures have equal values...
    CULTURAL RELATIVISM
  48. Focuses on interaction in microlevel social settings and emphasizes that an adequate explanation of social behaviour requieres understanding the subkective meanings people attach to their social circumstances...
    SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONSM
  49. Abstract principles that result in judgment of actions are called...
    VALUES
  50. Field of study...
    SOCIOLOGY
  51. The sum of practices, languages, symblos, ideologies, and mataerial objetcts that people create to deal with rea-life problems, Cultures enable people to adapto to, and thrive in, their environments.
    CULTURE
  52. Steps in doing research...
    • 1. Formulate question.
    • 2. Review existing literature.
    • 3. Select mehod.
    • 4. Collect data.
    • 5. Analyze data.
    • 6. Report results.
Author
patriciapsistos
ID
179166
Card Set
Sociology
Description
First midterm
Updated