Lecture 2 Flashcards
What is society?
A large group of people who live
together in an organized way
-All the people in a country, or in
several similar countries, can be
referred to as a society
persistent social interaction
(Check notes: think we had a discussion here)
What do sociologists study?
● Social inequality
● Social institutions
● Social change
What is social inequality?
- The gap between the advantaged and disadvantaged.
- Gaps exist in terms of rights, opportunities, rewards and
privileges. - Inequality is based on these differential experiences.
What are Social institutions?
Family, education, religion, economy, and government.
- Social institutions are defined as the norms, values, and rules
of conduct structuring human interactions.
What do we research on institutions and why?
– Function/dysfunction
– The way institutions facilitate social change
– That institutions are standardized ways of doing things, as actions become
regularized, patterned, and reproduced
– How institutions are contradictory, at times helping society run smoothly, at
other times reproducing social inequality within societies, but always potential
sites of social change
What is Social change (explain with an example)?
- Ex. secularization: process of a religion losing its authority
over individuals and in social life in general. - Sociologists wonder why religion has lost some of its influence in modern societies.
Explain social change with Religiosity: (how we can measure it)
how religious an individual or society is.
● How do we measure this?
● Canada’s religiosity is on the decline but religiosity is on the rise in many
parts of the world.
● Religion’s changing role in Canadian society is one example of social
change that sociologists focus on in their research.
● How does social change in one institution impact other social institutions?
● How does religiosity impacts health outcomes
What is sociology as a martial art?
Bourdieu refers to sociology as “a martial art, a means of self-defense.”
What are the three main things sociologists do?
- Sociologists look into large
patterns that shape individual lives - Sociology is a systematic and
evidence-based study inquiry into
the social world - Sociologists hope to provide
people with better understanding
of the world around them so they
can have a better lives
What are four major concepts we think of when we say sociology:
Social facts
social action
Social Relations
Martial Arts
What does the sociological eye see? (two things)
Assessing critically the familiar
Generalizing from the particular
What is the sociological imagination? (according to C. Wright Mills)
“The sociological imagination enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within society.
That is its task and its promise”
Who is C. Wright Mills (1916-1962)? (what did he think)
Influences : World War II, New Left in (Britain) and events like the Hungarian Revolution of 1956
Critical views of Western capitalism and Soviet Totalitarianism
Intellectuals have a key role to play in politics.
People who live in affluent societies and experience material well-being still share a
feeling of unease. Why is it so ?
According to the sociological Imagination, what are:
Troubles
Resolution
issues
- Troubles – occur within the character of the Individual
- Resolution – within the milieu (social environment) of the individual
- Issues – public matter
Check notes (Cherished values within society are being threatened)
Explain trouble vs issue with unemployment
- Troubles - One person who is unemployed in a town of 10000
- Issues - 2.800 million people are unemployed in a nation of 67.7 million
- If the economy is arranged in a cycle of boom and boost (the capitalist economy)
there can be no personal solution to the individual troubles of the unemployed
