2. Course themes

Question 0

So, the ____ ____ of sociology refers to analysis of culture (that is those things that largely have to do with the meaning we give things and relationships here we refer to things like values, norms and practices of social groups). Culture is embedded in, and shapes every aspect of social life.

Answer 0

cultural dimension

Question 1

You might be asking yourself what the difference is between a theme and a sociological dimension. The dimensions described in the previous section can be thought of as forms of ____.

Answer 1

analysis

Question 2

The ____ ____ of sociology examines the impact of social structures (eg. patriarchal social relations capitalism, the occupational division of labour) on the organisation of social life.

Answer 2

structural dimension

Question 3

The ____ ____ draws our attention to the way that current social practices have developed over time, and that the past helps to shape the present.

Answer 3

historical dimension

Question 4

Finally, the _____ ____ asks that sociologists be reflexive about their own positions, as well as ask how things might be otherwise.

Answer 4

critical dimension

Question 5

The ____ and ____ theme explores how the roles and identities that individuals inhabit are shaped by the social groups they belong to. All four sociological dimensions can contribute to understanding the connection between the social and the personal.

Answer 5

social and personal

Question 7

S&P. The ____ dimension might throw some light on the changes that have occurred in gender roles - what it means to be a man or woman has changed significantly over time (and therefore how people feel about their masculinity or femininity has also changed).

Answer 7

historical

Question 8

S&P. The ____ dimension alerts us to the fact that being masculine or feminine is experienced differently in different cultures.

Answer 8

cultural

Question 9

S&P. The ____ dimension might direct our attention to exploring how different workplaces, with different rules of entry and socialisation of workers, expect different things from men and women (e.g. the manual trades still have very traditional ideas of how to be a good male worker, while the teaching profession allows more scope for variation in acceptable forms of masculinity or femininity)

Answer 9

structural

Question 10

S&P. Finally, the ____ dimension would lead us to ask questions about who benefits from the acceptable forms of masculinity and femininity.

Answer 10

critical

Question 11

S&P. The point here is that we make choices within the ____ and ____, already provided for us by culture, history and social structure.

Answer 11

constraints and opportunities

Question 12

The ____ and the ____ theme addresses concerns around globalisation as a newish, but increasingly significant, social process.

Answer 12

local and the global

Question 13

L&G. Sociologists are interested in how processes of _____ and rationalisation impact on the local lives of social groups and individuals.

Answer 13

globalisation

Question 14

L&G. The point about this theme is not that global processes completely dominate the local scene, but that the two are _____.

Answer 14

interrelated

Question 15

L&G. In addition local communities often attempt to ____ global processes, and are sometimes successful.

Answer 15

resist

Question 16

The theme of ____ and ____ draws our attention to the fact that society is made up of a range of social groups that are different from each other.

Answer 16

differences and divisions

Question 17

D&D. In terms of _____ we have men and women, as well as people who we are transgendered.

Answer 17

gender

Question 18

D&D. In relation to ____ New Zealand society is made up of people who are Maori, Chinese, Samoan, Tongan, Dutch, Pakeha and so on.

Answer 18

ethnicity

Question 19

D&D. In terms of ____ categories, there are people who live in poverty as well as those who are comfortably off.

Answer 19

economic

Question 20

D&D. To say that there are social divisions is to point to two things. Firstly that there are ____ between people. Secondly, social divisions often involve ____ between groups.

Answer 20

Inequalities, conflict

Question 21

D&D. Sociologists recognise that different social groups have different interests in things (like wealth redistribution) because of their different position within hierarchical social relations of ____ or ____.

Answer 21

class or ethnicity

Question 22

D&D. Sociologically what is significant about some of these differences is that they also involve divisions between ____.

Answer 22

people

Question 23

S&P. The expectations and attributes associated with social positions such as teacher, mother, father, worker, etc.

Answer 23

Social roles

Question 24

S&P. Refers to the distinctive characteristics of persons in relation to social groups.

Answer 24

Identity

Question 25

L&G. Refers to the increasing interdependence between societies on a worldwide basis.

Answer 25

Globalisation

Question 26

L&G. Refers to the replacement of traditions, values, and emotions as motivators for behaviour in society with rational, calculated ones.

Answer 26

Rationalisation

Question 27

D&D. Social ____ occurs when resources in a given society are distributed unevenly, typically through norms of allocation, that engender specific patterns along lines of socially defined categories of persons.

Answer 27

Inequality

Question 28

S&P. Who we are can thus be seen, whether positively or negatively, as the creation of collective ____, ____ and ____.

Answer 28

traditions, resources and values

Question 29

L&G. There is not actually something called the ‘____ ____’ as such that works coherently: there are only global phenomena working in, through and across nation states.

Answer 29

global system

Question 30

L&G. The failure to ____ the local is also a matter of social meaning. We can never be the children of everywhere our identities and lives are always lived out in a particular way, in a particular place and time.

Answer 30

obliterate

Question 33

L&G. Brand New Zealand is one kind of expression of ‘____’ rather than of straightforward globalisation - the social space in which the local meets the global, with sometimes unpredictable results.

Answer 33

glocalisation

Question 34

L&G. In many ways, critics are right to say that globalisation is the way in which the powerful ____ the powerless in the world; that economic globalisation equates to exploitation.

Answer 34

dominate

Question 35

L&G. So whilst there are certainly imbalanced power relations at work, and ‘the local’ is constanty being pressured by ‘the global’, at the same time the global still ____ the local, and the local can even sometimes shape the global by reacting back on it.

Answer 35

needs

Question 36

L&G. McDonalds thus became the very paradigm of modern service capitalism and dumbed-down ____ ____, and many other firms followed its model, cementing a common global culture of consumption that covered not only the production of food and the venue for family occasions, but all sorts of leisure needs and even easential services.

Answer 36

cultural imperialism

Question 37

D&D. Sociologists are first of all interested in group differences of all sorts; then they are interested in how it is that some group differences get reproduced as _____ _____.

Answer 37

social divisions

Question 38

D&D. The force of the concept of social division is that differences are often experienced not just as interesting variations, but as ____ between people, classes, and cultures.

Answer 38

inequalities

Question 39

____ are abstract ideas that refer to the general properties of chosen aspects of social life. For example, the concept of riot does not include details about specific riots, but allows us to make some general statements about how to understand the phenomenon of riots.

Answer 39

Concepts

Question 40

_____ are propositions put forward for empirical testing.

Answer 40

Hypotheses

Question 41

_____ are bodies of ideas that attempt to explain in a general way why things happen as they do. Theorising involves abstracting an explanation from the particular features of a situation.

Answer 41

Theories