Download Principles of Sociology SOC-201

Introduction to Sociology
SOC-101
Unit 5 – Social Structure and Social Interaction
Levels of Sociological Analysis
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Macrosociology
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This is the analysis of social life that focuses on the broad
features of society
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Microsociology
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This is the analysis of social life that focuses on social
interaction
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This includes social class and how groups related to one another
Used by conflict theorists and functionalists
Goal is to examine the large-scale social forces that influence people
What people do when they come together
Used by symbolic interactionists
Both analyses need to be used to get a full perspective of
what is being studied
Macrosociological Perspective
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In order to understand human behavior, we must examine
the social structure
Social Structure
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This is the framework that surrounds us
Consists of the relationships of people and groups to one
another
It guides our behavior
People learn certain attitudes and behaviors because of their
location in the social structure
Components of Social Structure
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The components of social structure include:
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Culture
Social Class
Social Status
Roles
Groups
Social Institutions
Components of Social Structure
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Culture
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This refers to a group’s language, beliefs, values, behaviors,
gestures and material objects
This is the broadest framework that determines who we
become
Social Class
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A group of people who rank close to each other in income,
education, and power
This influences not only our behaviors but attitudes and ideas
Components of Social Structure
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Status
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A recognized social position that an individual occupies
Different from “prestige,” where someone who holds a high
position has high status
We hold multiple statuses at once
Each status adds to our social identity, defines our relationships
to one another, and guides our behavior
Components of Social Structure
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Status Set
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All the statuses a person holds at a particular time
For example, at one time a person can be a sister, daughter,
student, and friend
Status sets can change over the course of one’s life
We gain and lose many statuses over the course of our
lifetimes
Components of Social Structure
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Ascribed Status
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This is a social position that a person receives at birth or
assumes involuntarily later in life
Race, ethnicity, gender, daughter, teenager
Achieved Status
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This is a social position that a person assumes voluntarily and
reflects personal ability and choice
Honors student, spouse, parent, teacher
Components of Social Structure
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Master Status
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This is a position that carries exceptional importance for
identity and often shapes a person’s entire life
Cuts across all other statuses you hold
For most people occupation is a master status because it says
a lot about your social background, education, and income
Master status can be a negative if it is tied in with a disease,
disability, or even gender in some societies
Components of Social Structure
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Status Inconsistency
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When a person’s statuses are mismatched or contradict one
another
10-year-old college student or 25-year-old with Alzheimer's
Status Symbol
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Item used to identify a status
Wedding rings, uniforms, luxury car
Can also be negative like the “scarlet letter” in Hawthorne’s
book
Components of Social Structure
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Role
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The behaviors, obligations and privileges expected of someone
who holds a particular status
Individuals hold a status and perform a role
Roles lay out what is expected of people
Group
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People who regularly interact with one another
They usually share similar values, norms, and expectations
To belong to a group we have to yield the right to make
certain decisions about our behavior to others in the group
Social Institutions
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Social Institution
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The organized, usual, or stand ways by which society meets its
basic needs
Examples include family, education, law, military, and mass media
In industrialized societies, the social institutions are more
formal, while in tribal societies they are more informal
Society and Its Transformations
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Society
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A group of people who share a culture and a territory
In order to understand society, we need to examine its
transformation over time
Hunting and Gathering Society
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A group that depends on hunting and gathering for its survival
Consisted of small, nomadic groups that moved as they
depleted an area’s vegetation or pursued migratory animals
Had an egalitarian society since no one owned anything and no
one became wealthier than anybody else
There were no rulers as the group as a whole made decisions
Pastoral and Horticultural Societies
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Pastoralism
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Horticulture
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This is the domestication of animals
This is the cultivation of plants using hand tools
First Social Revolution
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With a dependable source of food, labor became specialized
and with that people were able to accumulate material
possessions
Creation of an elite, ruling class
Agricultural Societies
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Agricultural Societies
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Agriculture
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Large-scale cultivation using plows harnessed to animals or more
powerful energy sources
Growth of permanent settlements with populations growing
into the millions
Members of this society become even more specialized and
money is invented as a form of common exchange
Agricultural Societies
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Second Social Revolution
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Social inequality became a fundamental feature of social life
Most people worked as serfs or slaves
The elites were free to study philosophy, art, and literature
The elites also created armies to hold their power
Men began to gain pronounced power and privilege over
women
Industrial Societies
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Industrial Societies
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Industry
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The production of goods using advanced sources of energy (like
steam) to drive large machinery
Before 1765, most had depended upon human or animal
to provide power
With the development of the steam engine, production
became much more efficient
Industrial Societies
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Third Social Revolution
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Industrialization brought even greater surplus and even greater
social inequality
Those who first used the new technology created massive
amounts of wealth
People moved off their farms into the cities to work in
factories
Over time, the social equalities diminished as workers gained
rights, slavery was abolished, and there was the creation of a
more representative form of government
Postindustrial (Information) Societies
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Postindustrial Society
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It is based on information, services, and the latest technology
rather than on raw materials and manufacturing
Basic component is information
Fourth Social Revolution
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Based on the microchip, the information revolution is
transforming society
Social Integration
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Social Integration
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This is the degree to which members of a society are united by
shared values and other social bonds
With the way society has evolved and its many conflicting
groups, how does society still hold itself together?
Sociologists have found that as societies change, so do
people’s orientations to life
Mechanical/Organic Solidarity
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Emile Durkheim (1893)
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Believed that as society changes, the relationships amongst its
members also change
Mechanical Solidarity
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People have much in common through similar work, education,
religion, and lifestyle
This was found in more traditional and small scale societies
Mechanical/Organic Solidarity
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As societies get larger, labor becomes more specialized
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People become more dependent on one another for the work
they contribute to the whole
Organic Solidarity
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The interdependence that results from the division of labor
where people depend on others to fulfill their jobs
This is found in more modern and industrial societies
Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft
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Ferdinand Tönnies also analyzed the evolution of two
types of human association in 1887
Gemeinschaft (“Intimate Community”)
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A type of society in which life is intimate, and where everyone
in the community knows everyone else
Found in traditional and small scale societies
An example of this is Amish society
Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft
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Over time, society changed and the relationships among
people became more impersonal
Gesellschaft (“Impersonal Association”)
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A type of society that is dominated by impersonal relationships,
individual accomplishments, and self-interest
This is more modern day, industrial society
Microsociological Perspective
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While macrosociologists look at the overall features of
society, microsociologists looks that the interpersonal,
face-to-face interactions
Stereotypes
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Assumptions of what people are like, whether true or false
First impressions of a person can be shaped and affected by
their sex, race, ethnicity, age and clothing
This can also affect how you act towards that person
Personal Space
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Personal Space
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This refers to the surrounding area over which a person makes
some claim to privacy
The definition of personal space varies from culture to culture
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In the U.S., most people prefer to stand several feet apart when
talking
In the Middle East, they stand much closer
Edward Hall (1969)
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An anthropologist who observed that North Americans use
four different “distance zones” when it comes to personal
space
Personal Space
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Four levels of personal space
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Intimate Distance – (> 18 inches from our bodies)
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Personal Distance – (18 inches to 4 feet)
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Reserved for friends and acquaintances and ordinary conversations
Social Distance – (4 to 12 feet)
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Reserved for comforting, protecting, hugging, intimate touching, and
lovemaking.
For impersonal or formal relationships
For example, we use this zone for such things as job interviews
Public Distance – (<12 feet)
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Reserved for more formal relationships
For example, it is used to separate dignitaries and public speakers
from the general public
Dramaturgy
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Dramaturgy – Erving Goffman (1922-1982)
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Performances
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Analyzed social life in terms of drama or the stage
Socialization consists of learning how to perform on the stage
of life
Everyday life includes things like dress (costume), objects
carried along (props), and tone of voice and gestures (manner)
Impression Management
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People’s efforts to control the impressions that others receive
of them
Front Stage – This is where we give “our lines” to an audience
Back Stage – “Behind the scenes” where there is no audience
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This is where we can relax and let “our hair down”
Dramaturgy
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Roles play a vital aspect in dramaturgy
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Role Performance
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Role Conflict
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The ways in which someone performs a role within the limits that
role provides
Being the “ideal” daughter, or the “good” worker
The conflict someone feels between roles because the expectations
attached to one role are incompatible with the expectation of
another role
Do you study, go to your friend’s party, or help your parents out with
chores?
Role Strain
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Conflicts that someone feels within a role
A friendly boss still needs to keep his distance to evaluate his workers
properly
Dramaturgy
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Team Work
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Face-Saving Behavior
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The collaboration of two or more people to manage
impressions jointly.
Techniques used to salvage a performance going sour
Tact
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Helping someone save face; when members of the “audience”
help a performer recover from an embarrassment
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Role Strain and Role Conflict
Ethnomethodology
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Ethnomethodology – Harold Garfinkel (1967)
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Background Assumptions
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This is the study of the way people make sense of their
everyday surroundings using commonsense
These are deeply embedded common understandings of how
the world operates and how people are supposed to act
In order to discover our background assumptions we
must break the rules
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This is the only way to see how people construct their reality
Examples include bargaining for items in a supermarket, the
teacher playing the student for a class, talk to people an inch
away from their face
By breaking the rules, people will become agitated, surprised,
and possibly angry
Social Construction of Reality
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Social Construction of Reality
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The use of background assumptions and life experiences to
define what is real
Thomas Theorem – William and Dorothy Thomas (1928)
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“If men define situations as real, they are real in their
consequences”
We behave according to the way we perceive the world
It is not the reality of something that impresses itself on us, but
society impresses the reality of something on us
“Saints” and “Roughnecks”
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In 1978, William Chambliss published his study on the
“Saints” and the “Roughnecks”
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Examined two different delinquent groups in a town’s high
school
The “Saints” were boys from “good” middle-class families and
were expected to “go somewhere”
The “Roughnecks” were boys from lower-class families and
perceived to have “no futures”
“Saints” and “Roughnecks”
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The boys in both these groups skipped school, got drunk,
did a lot of fighting, and committed numerous acts of
vandalism
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After high school, seven of the eight Saints graduated
college and went on to well paying jobs
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The Saints actually were more delinquent since they skipped
school more often and committed more acts of vandalism
Three of them received advanced degrees
With the Roughnecks, only four finished high school
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Two did well in sports, went to college on scholarships, and
became high school coaches
Two who did not graduate wound up in prison for separate
murders
“Saints” and “Roughnecks”
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Using macrosociology, we can see:
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How social class can either open or close doors for us
How people learn different goals in different groups
Using microsociology, we can see:
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How the Saints used their reputation to their advantage and
how it negatively affected the Roughnecks
How the Saints used the fact that they had cars and were able
to use them to commit crimes in other communities (thus
keeping their “good” reputation in their own community
How the Roughnecks, by not having cars, were focused in a
small area and visible to their own community
Macro- and Micro-Sociology
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We need to study both macro- and micro-sociology to
get a complete understanding of social life as they both
give us different aspects