Stratification
structured social inequality or, more specifically, systematic inequalities between groups of people that arise as intended or unintended consequences of social processes and relationships.
Social equality
a condition whereby no differences in wealth, power, prestige, or status based on nonnatural conventions exist.
Dialectic
a two-directional relationship, one that goes both ways.
Ontological equality
the notion that everyone is created equally in the eyes of God.
- This view of equality makes us feel better about poverty
Equality of opportunity
the idea that inequality of condition is acceptable so long as the rules of the game, so to speak, remain fair.
Bourgeois society
a society of commerce (modern capitalist society, for example) in which the maximization of profit is the primary business incentive.
Equality of condition
the idea that everyone should have an equal starting point.
Equality of outcome
a position that argues each player must end up with the same amount regardless of the fairness of the "game".
- Most commonly associated with communist or socialist ideologies
Free rider problem
the notion that when more than one person is responsible for getting something done, the incentive is for each individual to shirk responsibility and hope others will pull the extra weight.
Estate system
politically based system of stratification characterized by limited social mobility.
Caste system
religion-based system of stratification characterized by no social mobility.
Class system
economically based system of stratification characterized by relative categorization and somewhat loose social mobility.
Proletariat
the working class. (Marx)
Bourgeoisie
the capitalist class. (Marx)
Contradictory class locations
the idea that people can occupy locations in the class structure which fall between the two "pure" classes defined by Marx.
- idea developed by Erik Olin Wright
Status hierarchy system
a system of stratification based on social prestige.
Elite-mass dichotomy system
system of stratification that has a governing elite, a few leaders who broadly hold the power of society.
Meritocracy
a society where status and mobility are based on individual attributes, ability, and achievement.
Socioeconomic status (SES)
an individual's position in a stratified social order.
- measured by occupation, wealth, income, and education.
Income
money received by a person for work or from returns on investments. How society is stratified today.
Wealth
a family's or individual's net worth (that is, total assets minus total debts).
Upper class
a term for the economic elite.
Middle class
a term commonly used to describe those individuals with nonmanual jobs that pay significantly more than the poverty line - though this is a highly debated and expansive category, particularly in the United States, where broad swathes of the population con
Social mobility
the movement between different positions within a system of social stratification in any given society.
Structural mobility
mobility that is inevitable from changes in the economy.
Status-attainment model
approach that ranks individuals by socioeconomic status, including income and educational attainment, and seeks to specify the attributes characteristic of people who end up in more desirable occupations.
Female circumcision
the removal of a woman's sexually sensitive clitoris.
Feminism
an intellectual, consciousness-raising movement to get people to understand that gender is an organizing principle of life. The underlying belief is that women and men should be accorded equal opportunities and respect.
Sex
the biological differences that distinguish male from female.
Sexuality
refers to desire, sexual preference, sexual identity, and behavior.
Gender
denotes a social position, the set of social arrangements, that are built around sex categories.
Essentialism
line of thought that explains social phenomena in terms of natural ones.
Biological determinism
line of thought that explains social behavior in terms of biological givens.
- your social behavior should be a direct result of your sex
Hegemonic masculinity
dominant and privileged, if invisible, category of men. regarded as the norm
Gender roles
sets of behavioral norms assumed to accompany one's status as a male or female. related more to social status than biology
Patriarchy
a nearly universal system involving the subordination of femininity to masculinity.
Structural functionalism
theoretical tradition claiming that every society has certain structures (the family, the division of labor, or gender) that exist in order to fulfill some set of functions (reproduction of the species, production of goods, etc.).
Sex role theory
Talcott Parsons's theory that men and women perform their sex roles as breadwinners and wives and mothers, respectively, because the nuclear family is the ideal arrangement in modern societies, fulfilling the function of reproducing workers.
Doesnt allow
Homosexual
the social identity of a person who has sexual attraction to and/or relations with other persons of the same sex.
Sexism
occurs when a person's sex or gender is the basis for judgment, discrimination, and hatred against him or her.
Sexual harassment
an illegal form of discrimination, involving everything from inappropriate jokes on the job to outright sexual assault to sexual "barter" - all intended to make women feel uncomfortable and unwelcome, particularly on the job.
Glass ceiling
an invisible limit on women’s climb up the occupational ladder.
Glass escalator
the promotional ride men take to the top of a work organization, especially in feminized jobs.
Race
a group of people who share a set of characteristics -typically, but not always, physical ones- and are said to share a common bloodline.
- it is a social construct that changes over time and place.
Racism
the belief that members of separate races possess different and unequal traits.
Scientific racism
nineteenth-century theories of race that characterize a period of feverish investigation into the origins, explanations, and classifications of race.
Ethnocentrism
the belief that one’s own culture or group is superior to others and the tendency to view all other cultures from the perspective of one’s own.
Black Feminism
- Gender doesn't function in a vacuum
- women are located in a matrix of domination - overlapping factors of class, gender, and race
Social Darwinism
the application of Darwinian ideas to society, namely, the evolutionary "survival of the fittest
Eugenics
literally meaning "well born"; the theory of controlling the fertility of populations to influence inheritable traits passed on from generation to generation.
Nativism
movement to protect and preserve indigenous land or culture from the so-called dangerous and polluting effects of new immigrants.
One-drop rule
the belief that "one drop" of black blood makes a person black, a concept that evolved from U.S. laws forbidding miscegenation.
Miscegenation
the technical term for multiracial marriage; literally meaning "a mixing of kinds" it is politically and historically charged-sociologists generally prefer exogamy or outmarriage.
Racialization
the formation of a new racial identity, in which new ideological boundaries of difference are drawn around a formerly unnoticed group of people.
Ethnicity
one’s ethnic quality or affiliation. It is voluntary, self-defined, nonhierarchal, fluid, and multiple, and is based on cultural differences, not physical ones per se.
Symbolic ethnicity
a nationality, not in the sense of carrying the rights and duties of citizenship but identifying with a past or future nationality. For later generations of white ethnics, something not constraining but easily expressed, with no risks of stigma and all th
Straight-line assimilation
Robert Parks's 1920 universal and linear model for how immigrants assimilate: first they arrive, then they settle in, and finally they achieve full assimilation in a newly homogenous country.
Primordialism
Clifford Geertz's term to explain the persistence of ethnic ties because they are fixed in deeply felt or primordial ties to one's homeland culture.
Pluralism (salad bowl)
the presence and engaged coexistence of numerous distinct groups in one society.
Segregation
the legal or social practice of separating people on the basis of their race or ethnicity that don't give them equal rights.
- Still evident in today's schools, housing, and prisons
Genocide
the mass killing of a population based on racial, ethnic or religious traits.
Subaltern
describes a subordinate, oppressed group of people.
Collective resistance
an organized effort to change a power hierarchy on the part of a less-powerful group in a society.
Prejudice
negative thoughts and feelings about an ethnic or racial group.
Discrimination
harmful or negative acts (not mere thoughts) against people deemed inferior on the basis of their racial category without regard to their individual merit.
Culture of poverty
the argument that poor people adopt certain practices that differ from those of middle-class, "mainstream" society in order to adapt and survive in difficult economic circumstances.
Underclass
the notion, building on the culture of poverty argument, that the poor not only are different from mainstream society in their inability to take advantage of what mainstream society has to offer but also are increasingly deviant and even dangerous to the
Perverse incentives
reward structures that lead to suboptimal outcomes by stimulating counterproductive behavior; for example, welfare - to the extent that it discourages work efforts
Absolute poverty
the point at which a household's income falls below the necessary level to purchase food to physically sustain its members.
Relative poverty
a measurement of poverty based on a percentage of the median income in a given location.
Parenting stress hypothesis
a paradigm in which the psychological aspects of poverty exacerbate household stress levels; this stress, in turn, leads to detrimental parenting practices such as yelling, shouting, and hitting, which are not conducive to healthy child development.
Medicalization
the process by which problems or issues not traditionally seen as medical come to be framed as such.
Sick role
- concept by Parsons that describes the social rights and obligations of a sick individual.
- Rights:
o To not perform normal social roles
o Not to be held accountable for their condition
-Obligations:
o Try to get well
o Seek competent help and comply wi
Morbidity
illness in a general sense.
Mortality
death.
John Jacques Rousseau (18th Century)
said that private property leads to social inequality which leads to social conflict
Adam Ferguson and John Millar
o Agree that private property creates inequality but they see that as a good thing
o It means some are getting ahead and creating assets
Thomas Malthus
o Wrote his major work in 1798; priest with a cleft pallet
o Viewed inequality favorably as a means of controlling the population
o Equal distribution of resources would increase world population to unsustainable levels
� Ultimately would cause mass starv
master-slave dialectic
- described by George Hegal
� Model of mutual dependence (master depends on slave to do some things, slave depends on master to do other things)
� He said the master-slave dialectic will die out as society gains more free people over time
psychoanalytic theories
o Functions on individualistic explanations as opposed to societal ones
o Assumption�natural differences between sexes dictate behavior
Conflict Theory
o Patriarchal capitalists benefit through systems that subordinate women
o Socialist feminists argue that all social relations stem from gender inequality
Sexual Identity
set of practices and attitudes leading to identity formation
Ex: (Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, etc.)
Emergence of Sexual Identities
� Late 1800s�growing body of medical literature classified people as homosexuals, instead of just actions
� American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of disorders in 1973
Michel Foucalt
- led the way to post-structuralist notions of the body and sexuality as historical productions.
-human sexuality is created entirely through social interaction
Kinsey Report
Americans have wide variety of sexual behaviors or desires
Kinsey Sexuality Scale
based on sexual thoughts, behaviors, identity; scale of 0-6 with 0 being heterosexual, 3 being bisexual, and 6 being homosexual.
Integrative Perspective
� Idea that sexual identities are determined by both social and biological factors
� Some studies link biology (genetics, sex hormones) to sexual orientation
Queer Theory
� Sexual life is artificially organized into categories that reflect the power of heterosexual norms
� Rejects the idea of biological influences on sexuality
Phrenology
� Racial classification based on skull measurements
� Blumenbach (father of modern anthropology) founded the five classifications of race
White
� Socially constructed
o Who is considered white depends on the historical period
� Involves invisible privileges
Assimilation (melting pot)
new group ends up melting into the new group.
o Process in which immigrants arrive, settle in, and mimic local behaviors
� Everyone eventually blends in completely
o Also known as primordialism
� The idea that ethnic ties are fixed for biological or cultu
Residential Segregation
structural racism
� Set of social factors that have a racist outcome
Poverty line
o Federally defined income limit
o Definition created in the 1960s
o Estimates the level of absolute poverty
- Assumes food is 1/3 of expenses
Poverty and Social Problems
o Poverty connected to crime, poor educational outcomes, divorce
o Debate in America: is poverty the cause or effect of social ills?
Swapping
exchange time, money, etc. to cover temporary shortfalls
William Julius Wilson
Deemphasized welfare, said urban poverty caused by:
� Deindustrialization
� Globalization
� Suburbanization
� Discrimination
3 Theories on how poverty affects children
1. Kids are deprived of basic necessities
2. Parenting stress hypothesis
� Stress of poverty leads to detrimental practices (shouting, hitting)
3. Personal characteristics that cause poverty also cause negative parenting
(very little evidence that parenta
Moving to Opportunity
� Families in public housing were randomly selected to move into low poverty areas
� Adults- happier, healthier, less stress from fear of violence
� Children- school outcomes improved, injuries and asthma decreased
Social Determinants Theory
social status position can determine your health
Height
determined by genetics and environment
� Black women born in the 1980s are �" shorter than previous generations (1960s)
o True for mid to low income only
o Diet is considered one of the main components (eat worse food)
Whitehall study
- study about healthy
-done on civil servants in Britain
� Lower status = higher rates of morbidity (illness) and mortality (death)
� Conclusion: stress from low social status leads to poor health
Health Discrepancies
-starkest differences are between whites and blacks
� Due to socioeconomic status and racist environment
Infant mortality
significantly higher for African Americans than any other race
(DSM) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
interesting because it represents the social construction of mental illness
? DSM II - included homosexuality as a psychiatric disorder but it was removed in 1973
? DSM III - largely atheoretical (no certain cause)
- major changes that took place between