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What is Sociology?
- -The scientific study of social behavior and human groups.
- Influence of social relationships on individual attitudes and behavior.
- Not based on opinion but data
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Sociological Imagination
- -Developed by C. Wright Mills
- An Awreness of the relationship between the individual and the wider society
- An "outside" viewBeyond Personal to public
- Personal experiences-Public Perspective
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August Comte
- France
- Coined Sociology
- "positivism"
- Established social principle and applied them to reform
- Social static vs. Social Dynamic
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Social Static
- That within a culture that doesnt change readily: family, educationtakes time
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Social Dynamic
- That within a culture changes quickly
- Fashion, Technology
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Harriet Martineau
- Society in America
- Work based off assumptions and secondary documents, letters, books.
- Comtes ideas to english and reduced to 2 volumes
- Wealthy background allowed her to do the things she did
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Emile Durkheim
Showing how social forces impact peoples behavior
- Focus and thorough research
- Suicide
Social factors underlie suicide- Social integrationThe degree to which people are tied to their social group.
- I.E.
- Males are more likely to kill themselves because of their masculinity, need to sustain their families but cannot/ Wealthier males have more freedom and less connectedness.
- Woman Are less likely to commit suicide because of their nurturing role associated with females.
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Anomie
- Breaking down of the controlling influences of society
- Children in the past listened to any adults in general. Today children only listen to their parents
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Karl Marx
People need to be active in Changing society
- Set framework for social conflict theory
- Class conflict is the engine of human history: Economic ViabilitySociety divided into classes who clash in pursuit of their own class interest
- Upperclass needs are very different than middle classGroup identificatioms and associations influence an individuals place in societyRelationships within the class affect position of the individual
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Praxis
Take what you know and apply it
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Max Weber
- Verstehen:Insight and understanding ones intellectual work.
- Must understand peoples subjective meanings attached by themselves to their actions
- How oneself views and explain their own actions
- Very Complex
- i.e.
- Im such a bad mother the children are better off dead>> The animal is suffering so we should put it down.
- Believed religion was the central force in change.
- Ideal Type
- Made up model that can be measured against actual cases. Can be evaluated
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W.E.B. DuBois
- Made through many constraints
- pushed away by society because of ethnicity
- Founding member of NAACP
- Worked under Max Weber
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Herbert Spencer
- Very popular
- Believed in social darwinism-
- Overtime societies will improve-
- coined term survival of the fittest
- His theory was contradictive
- I.e. America has advanced technology but a high infant mortality rate
- Vegatative states allowed by technology-Fit society?-Did not conduct scientific studies
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Structural Functionalism
- MACRO SOCIAL
- Society is a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability
- Social structure-Relatively stable patterns of social behavior:i.e. standard behavior walking into class on the first day.Useless ideals, values, thoughts, or practice are not passed down from gen. to gen.
- Bad habits or things in which we have no idea why we are doing them may also get passed down
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Manifest Function
Recognized and intended qonsequences of any social pattern- The transmission of knowledge at school.
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Latent Function
Largely unrecognized or unintended consequence.-School provides free childcare in k-12. Higher education is the place for meeting oned marriage partner.
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Dysfunction
undesirable consequence or disruption to social structure.-Crime, But criminal need crime as well as guards, parol officer etc(now crime is functional)
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Social Conflict theory
- Some people benefit from things in society while other dont-(education) examine differences in individuals living in poorer communities to richer ones.
- scarce resources-not everyone can have everything
- society is viewded as an arena of inequality, generating conflict and change
- interested in how societys institutions including family, government, religion, education and media may help to maintain the privleges of some groups and keep others in subservient positions- female siblings cannot stay out later than the same age male sibling because of sex.
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Feminist Perspective
- Inequity in gender is central to all behavior and organization.
- Allied with conflict theory but tends to focus on relationships of everyday lif like interactionist
- analysis beyond the male point of view
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Symbolic Interactionist
MICRO SOCIAL
- Interactons with other humans have a behavioral impact collectively on society
- Subtle messages influence long term
- Humans live in a world of meanigful objects-wedding ring is a symbol of current marriage, while not wearing it is a symbol of dissolved marriage.
- -running into a burning building is mal adaptive behavior but the reasons we do it are personal and usually meaningful to the individual
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What is culture?
- Subjective Culture:Beliefs,Values,Behavior that together, form a peoples way of life.Harder to change than material/physical culture.
- Material Culture:physical or technological aspects of our daily lives
- American culture is more subjected to adopt a more physical culture rather than subjective.
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Cultural Universasls
General practices found in every culture:Family arrangement, kinship, food, sex taboos, recreation.
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Cultural Diffusion
- process by which a group cultural item spreads from group to group.
- More powerful culture takes over smaller culture beliefs and materials are diffused from larger to smaller
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What is the purpose of culture?
- Major mode of adaptation.
- Limits on behavior and guides us along predictable paths.
- becomes internalized-DOXA:umbrella when it rains, parties for birthday
- Used to survive
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Characteristics of culture
- •Culture is shared
- –uniquely
- •Culture is learned
- Culture begins in utero
- Use culture to modify certain characteristics of everything
- •Culture is based on symbols•Culture is integrated –Cannot change one element without impacting another
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Values
– culturally defined standards which serve as broad guideline for social living (can be in conflict: war and peace)
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High culture
– cultural patterns that distinguish a society’s elite-going to an opera, elite society
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•Popular culture
– cultural patterns that are widespread among a society’s population-mainstream
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•Subcultures
– cultural patterns that distinguish some segment of a society’s population
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Counterculture
– cultural patterns that strongly oppose those widely accepted in society
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Ethnocentrism
- – the practice of judging another culture by the standards of one’s own culture
- -culture relativism deals with problem of
- i.e. my moms better than your mom
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Cultural relativism
– the practice of judging a culture by its own standards
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Socialization
- Lifelong social experiences by which individuals develop their human potential and learn culture
- group
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Sigmund Freud’s Personality Model
- Id – the human being’s basic drives-solely based on individual needs. me, me, me<<decisions based off
- Ego – a person’s conscious efforts to balance innate pleasure-seeking drives with the demands of society
- Superego – the operation of culture within the individual-what should i do/decisions based on needs of society
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Jean Piaget – Stages of Cognitive Development
- 1st stage – sensorimotor – level of human development in which individuals experience the world only through sensory contact:tactile,taste,-sense-Brain catalouges sensory interactions during early childhood
- 2nd stage – preoperational – individuals first use language and other symbols
- Stage 3 – concrete operational – individuals first perceive causal connections in their surroundings:7-12yrs if i do this, this will happen
- relationships
- limits of things
- Stage 4 – formal operational – individuals think abstractly and critically-more precise thoughts like i want to make money instead of i want to be a teacher.
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George Herbert Mead
- 1st stage – Preparatory stage – children imitate people around them(must have developmental milestone to move into next stage-recognition of self>>paint on babies face realization)
- 2nd stage – Play stage- role taking – mentally assuming the perspective of another(key time fordevelopment of empathy : developed socially)
- 3rd stage – Game stage- can consider tasks and relationships simultaneously understanding tasks and roles involved with sports:>>players roles switch depending on posession
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Erik Erikson
- 8 stages of development
- Stage 1 – Infancy – trust vs. distrust
- Stage 2 - Toddlerhood – autonomy vs. doubt and shame
- Stage 3 – Preschool – Initiative vs. guilt
- Stage 4 – Pre-Adolescence – industriousness vs. inferiority
- Stage 5 – Adolescence – identity vs. confusion
- Stage 6 – Young Adulthood – Intimacy vs. isolation
- Stage 7 – Middle Adulthood – Making a difference vs. Self-absorption
- Stage 8 – Old Age – integrity vs. despair
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Charles Horton Cooley
- Looking glass self – we learn who we are by interacting with others
- Imagine how we are presenting ourselves
- Imagine how people are evaluating us
- Form opinions about ourselves based on our perceptions
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Agents of Socialization
- Family – the most important agent of socialization:No suitable substitute for parents in society
- Peer groups
- School
- media
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Forced Socialization
- Anticipatory socialization – social learning geared toward gaining a desired position
- Resocialization – altering personality through deliberate control of the environment
- Total Institution – all aspects of a person’s life are under one authority
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Personality
– a person’s fairly consistent patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting
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Self
– a dimension of personality composed of an individual’s self-awareness and self-image-towards the group
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Beliefs
- specific statements which people hold to be true
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Norms –
rules and expectations by which society guides the behavior of its members •–Formal -laws, gov.–Mores – norms that are widely observed and have great moral significance •informal-personal ettiquette, picking nose/Folkways – norms for routine, casual interaction
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–Cultural transmission –
passing of cultural traits from one generation to the next Cultural Transmission passed from parents to children-watching sports, dress, food
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•Cultural integration
– close relationship among various elements of a cultural system :school systems intertwine with politics, family life etc
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•Cultural lag –
period of maladjustment when on element of culture changes and disrupts a system:(material)•
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–Innovation –
introducing a new idea or object
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»Invention –
creating new elements tht change society usually technology phines cars
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»Discovery –
understanding an idea not fully understood before
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–Symbol –
anything that carries a particular meaning recognized by people who share culture:to understand how people percieve situations most understand smbols.
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–Language –
a system of symbols that allows people to communicate with each other •Language is our most important symbolic system •Ensures the continuity of culture
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•Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis –
people perceive the world through the cultural lens of language. -The amount of words for technology and money the lack of words for kinship in the english lang.
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