Major Social Processes

Culture

Deviance

Dimensions of Social Inequality
Social Stratification & Inequalities

Socialization

Approaches to Human Development

Deterministic

Biological (Nature)

Social (Nurture)

Behaviour due to genes

Behaviour can be taught and learned

Non-deterministic

Agency to influence what happens, make choices

Degree to which characteristics are determine

Learning written and unwritten rules
Society's culture

Types of socialization

Primary

Secondary

Anticipatory

Resocialization

Typically through family

Later in life through experiences

Learning in advance, practicing
e.g. university, job interview

Relearning; unlearning old ways, learning new

Voluntary
e.g. new school, job, retire

Involuntary
e.g. crime trial, labelled inmate

Degradation ceremony

Rite of passage

Ritual or ceremony signalling change of status
e.g. wedding, graduation

Shift in person's status
e.g. court

Total institution

Regulates all aspects of person's life though:
physical isolation
breaking down identity
e.g. name replaced by number
rebuild self through rewards and punishment
e.g. residential school, military

Theoretical Approaches

Structural Functionalism

Individuals take in expectation from society
Central role of institutions in process
Socialization ensures societal stability

Agents of socialization

Purpose for socialization

Institutions

Central role in socialization process

Role Theory
Robert Merton

Status

Recognized social position one occupies
e.g. student, professor, child, parent
Comes with rights, responsibilities, expectations

Status set

All statuses that one holds

Master status

Ascribed

Given at birth or assumed involuntarily later
e.g. race, sex, prison inmate

Achieved

Voluntarily through effort
e.g. university graduate

Often shapes entire life
e.g. criminal, race, disabilities

Role

Set of behaviours and attitudes comes with status
e.g. student in class

Role set
e.g. professor + teacher + collegue + researcher

Through socialization, know roles for statuses

Role strain

Tension between roles connected to one status
e.g. student wanting to participate, don't want other students to look bad

Role conflict

Tension between expectations related different statuses
e.g. mom in hospital, friend's birthday, upcoming exam, emergency at work

Role exit

Processes of voluntarily or involuntarily disengaging from role
e.g. quit job, fired from job, academic probation
Stress from many roles, preform role exit

Critical/conflict sociology

Differential socialization reflects and produces inequalities

Example: Toys for boys vs. girls

Symbolic interactionism

Self develops through and guides social interactions
Society imposes itself on individual

The Looking-Glass Self
Charles Horton Cooley

Think of ourselves depending on what others think of us

How we imagine we appear
How we imagine others judge us
how we feel

4 Stages of Development
George Herbert Mead

Preparatory

Imitating close people without understanding
e.g. parents, siblings

Play

Taking role, understanding
e.g. playing parent through their eyes

Game

More than one role, interactions, anticipate other roles
e.g. ballgame, considering other players

Generalized other

General society, cultural norms, values, beliefs
Reference to evaluate others
Abstract idea of society, expectations

Agents of socialization

Family

First, most powerful
Primary socialization during childhood
Transmit social class, values, beliefs

Direct learning

Indirect learning

Resources available to them
e.g. Wealth, good school, tutor, poor, no opportunity, suffer in education

Example: Restaurant, parents treat waitstaff poorly, learn their social position (higher than social position)

Reciprocal socialization

Parents learn from children

Peer group

No adult supervision
Share age, common interest, social position

Peer pressure

External pressure from peers

Education

Hidden curriculum
e.g. competition, ranking students

Listening to authority, following orders, align thinking

Mass media

Societal culture, expectations, stereotypes
e.g. magazines, news, social media

Social structure involving...
values
beliefs
knowledge
practices
behaviours
material objects

Nonmaterial culture

Intangible, represents something
e.g. social norms, holidays

Material culture

Tangible, artifacts, human creation
e.g. technology, phones, cars, buildings, food

Transmitted through generations, info added/removed, preservation contested
e.g. social media, old buildings

Structural functionalism

Cultural universals

Can observe past and present culture
e.g. live in families, division of labour, different gender roles

Provides order, function to society

Conflict theory
Antonio Gramsci

Tied to capitalism
Different groups have more influence to culture

Ideology

Powerful set of beliefs about society and people
e.g. inequality

Cultural hegemony

Those who don't profit from societal arrangements, believe and support them
e.g. tuition for university; want to reduce but not rid of it

Culture justifies inequality

Symbolic interactionism
Dennis Wrong

System of symbols and ideas

Always being (re)created through individual actions

Elements of culture

Artifacts

Beliefs (Ideology)

Values
Harriet Martineau

Symbols

Norms

Socially defined standards used by culture
Broad guideline

Ideal vs. actual
e.g. academic integrity, students think certain way, when opportunity given, go against

Rules or expected standards of behaviour

Folkways

Mores

Taboos

Informal norms, everyday behavior
e.g. holding door, salutation in email

Formalized, institutionalized, laws
e.g. laws stealing murder, returning late books (fines)

Deeply ingrained in social consciousness
e.g. incest, child porn

Sanctions

Norm enforcement

Positive (Rewards)
e.g. smile, bonus point, trophy

Negative (Punishment)
e.g. dirty look, parking ticket, fine

Informal
e.g. dirty look, smile

Formal
e.g. fine, A on test

Items, (in)tangible with meaning, require interpretation
e.g. house and status

Language

System of symbols for communication

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

Language culture specific
e.g. Quebec and French language

Sociolinguistics

Factors

Race, ethnicity, age, gender, region
e.g. adults swear, children cannot

Dialect

Specific language, varies from region to region
e.g. Newfoundland dialect; less educated

Accents

Not all accents equal
e.g. sinking, thinking

Code switching

move from one cultural context to another
e.g. different dialect to different people

Double consciousness

Seeing else through others, anticipating

Implicit

Not visible

Explicit

Types of culture

Subculture

Countercultures

Rejects mainstream and adopts opposing
e.g. sexual revolution, black liberation, kkk

High culture
Pierre Bourdieu

Specific skills and knowledge
e.g. ballet, opera, classical music, art gallery, cuisine

Cultural capital

Born into or can learn

Learning not the same as growing with it
e.g. new language, always accents, mistakes

Popular culture

Culture of many people
e.g. GoT, Harry Potter, 50 shades, Twilight

Mass culture

Created by people in power, must consume
e.g. TV shows, magazines, popular music

Globalization

Cultural expansion, west to east

Share cultural elements of mainstream, distinct in other elements
e.g. deaf community, hobbies, music, veganism

Reactions to diversity

Ethnocentrism

Looking at other culture with own
Own culture is superior
Intentional or unintentional

Eurocentrism

EUW and NA culture used to evaluate others

Xenophobia

Rational fear of "the other"

Reverse ethnocentrism

Culture other than one's own by standard
e.g. 2nd gen immigrants, conflict with parents culture

Cultural relativism

Should be viewed and evaluated from culture itself
e.g. Hijab

Willingness to understand and accept practices different from own
Make sense in different context
Not judge

Conformity

Social control

Regulate thoughts and behaviours

Milgram experiment

Electric shock to student, researcher tells to go on

Stanford prison experiment
Philip Zimbardo

Guards were too tough, unethical

Asch experiment

Different line lengths

Behaviour that strays from norm (different)

Crime

Violation of laws enacted by government

Informal norms/sanctions

Formal norms/sanctions

White collar crime
Edwin Sutherland

Crime by person of high social status, respect in occupation
e.g. environmental pollution

Occupational
e.g. sexual harassment, embezzlement, pilfering

Corporate
e.g. industrial accidents, pollution, price-fixing
e.g. bread

Structural functionalism
Emile Durkheim

Social cohesion

Mechanical solidarity

Common values, beliefs, cooperation of people

Collective conscious

People know each other, share things

Organic solidarity

Interrelated parts coming together, form society
e.g. specialization; family, education

Anomie

No clear values, norms to guide, deviant more likely

Some deviance functional for society

(Re)affirms cultural values and norms

Response clarifies moral boundaries

Response brings people together

Encourages social change
e.g. cannabis, same-sex marriage, Viola Desmond

Strain theory
Robert Merton

People choose deviant lifestyle
Disconnect between goals and ways to achieve
e.g. jobs, education

Conformity

Accept institutionalized
Accept cultural goals
e.g. working for good grades

Innovation

Reject institutionalized
Accept cultural goals
e.g. cheating

Ritualism

Accept institutionalized
Reject cultural goals
e.g. doing work, not getting good grades

Retreatism

Reject institutionalized
Rejected cultural goals
e.g. don't care, floating

Rebellion
e.g. other forms of education, no grades, enlightenment

Critical sociology

Social inequality causes crime and deviance

Laws reflect and reproduce inequalities
e.g. drugs, rich and powerful get away

Powerful have resources to resist labelling

Uneven law enforcement
e.g. good lawyer can get out of crime

Symbolic interactionism

Explain how people view behaviour as "normal" or "deviant"

Differential association theory
Edwin Sutherland

Deviance result of differential socialization

Learn conformity and deviance through interactions
e.g. role models, peer pressure, groups

Outcome of socialization and interaction, not by individual

Labelling theory
Howard S. Becker

Apply rules to people when violation occurs
e.g. theft, need define property, rule of theft

Act and process not changed, regulation has
e.g. cannabis, smoking in restaurants

Claims

Impose meaning, define situation from specific statements

Claims-making

Making claim about social phenomenon or situation

Claims-maker

Individuals or groups making claims

Moral entrepreneurs

Power to make rules to penalize wrongdoings
e.g. panhandling

Moral panic

Minor deviance arises, amplified by media
e.g. drug usage place

Stigma
Erving Goffman

Powerful negative social label, changes self-concept and identity

Physical traits

Disabilities, weight
e.g. overweight; lack self-control, lazy, lack ambition

Individual character

Seen as weak, unnatural, treacherous
e.g. judge people who take own lives, gay, criminals
Cannot resocialize into society

Group membership

Association with groups, same as members
e.g. race, nation, religion

Degradation ceremonies
e.g. trials, involuntary resocialization

Donna Haraway

Situated knowledges
e.g. perspective, must critically investigate

Spiral model of learning

  1. placing ourselves
  2. reflection
  3. analysis
  4. strategy
  5. action

Responses to oppression

Backlash

Rely on stereotypes, justify existing inequalities
us vs. them
e.g. First Nations topic, change to how corrupt leaders are

Denial

No oppression left, always laws to protect
Feel personally attacked, past happened awhile ago

Guilt

Personally responsible, helplessness, resign from discussion
e.g. residential schools, overwhelmed, seek forgiveness

Allyship

Learn and reflect, take responsibility of own privileges
Connect with others, collective responsibility

Markers of identity/Structured inequality

Status hierarchy

race
ethnicity
nationality/citizenship
gender
sexual orientation
education
social class
social status
age
religion
(dis)ability
geographic location

Hierarchies exist within markers, socially created

Intersectionality
Kimerle Williams Crenshaw
Partricia Hill Collins

Social categories interconnected
"matrix of domination"

Dimensions of inequality do not operate in isolation
e.g. women's experiences differ with race

Social stratification

Hierarchical organization into differing levels:
economic resources
social prestige
power

Groups of people have access

Privilege

Advantages some groups have, others do not

Organized around class, race, ethnicity, gender, etc.

Operates at group level

Social inequality

Long term, differences in access to opportunities

Social arrangements

Individal

Agency

Blaming the victim

Out of their control, what are their options?

Dominant culture

"The" culture of a country

Impose values, language, behaviour, interpretation through economic and political power
e.g. official languages, national holidays

Diversity in government body

Subordinate cultures

Less powerful groups, devalued by dominant

Feel power of dominant, exist in opposition

Oppression

Domination of subordinate group by dominant
e.g. indigenious vs. racialized immigrants

Intentional or unintentional
e.g. MC exams

Complex and fluid

Occurs at individual, cultural, structural

Leads to privilege and social exclusion
e.g. born in Canada, same-sex marriage

Classism, racism, sexism, heterosexism

Discrimination

Prejudice

Pre-judgements of others based on group

Attitude, postive/negative, subtle/blatant, non-directional

Stereotypes

example: neighbourhood segregation

Positive/negative, non-directional

Individuals treated differently based on group
e.g. public spaces and able bodied people

Action, positive/negative, (un)intentional, (in)direct, (non-)directional
e.g. forgetting their perspective

Exaggerated, overgeneralized descriptions

Systematic oppression organized around traits

Notions of superiority/inferiority, dominant is norm, directional
e.g. immigrants encouraged to integrate

Interpersonal

Blatant/overt, subtle/covert

Systematic (directional)
e.g. family, education, work, health care, law, government, social media

Microaggressions

Same comment multiple times
Small but adds up