MID-TERM Flashcards
What is sociology?
The systematic study of human groups and their interactions
What is sociological perspective?
A view of society based on the dynamic relationships between individuals and the larger social network which we all live.
What are personal troubles?
Personal challenges that require individual solutions
What are social issues?
Challenges caused by larger social factors that require collective solutions.
What is quality of mind?
Mills’s term for the ability to view personal circumstance within a social context.
What is sociological imagination?
C.W Mills’s term for the ability to perceive how dynamic social forces influence individual lives.
What are cheerful robots?
People who are unwilling or unable to see the social world as it truly exists.
What is agency?
The assumption that individuals have the ability to alter their socially constructed lives.
What is structure?
The network of relatively stable opportunities and constraints influencing individual decisions and behaviours.
What is patriarchy?
A pervasive and complex system where men control the social, political and economic resources of society.
What is socioeconomic status?
A combination of variables (income, education, occupation, etc.) used to rank people into a hierarchical structure of social status.
What does SES stand for
Socioeconomic Status
What is ascribed status?
Attributes (advantages and disadvantages) assigned at birth (e.g., income level).
What is achieved status?
Attributes developed throughout life as a result of effort and skill (e.g., course grades).
What is positivism?
A theoretical approach that considers all understanding to be based on science.
What is anti-positivism?
A theoretical approach that considers knowledge and understanding to be the result of human subjectivity
What are values?
Cultural beliefs about ideal goals and behaviours that serve as standards for social life and that identify something as right, desirable, and moral
What is quantitative sociology
The study of behaviours that can be measured (e.g., income levels).
What is qualitative sociology?
The study of non measurable, subjective behaviours (e.g., the effects of divorce).
What is macrosociology?
The study of society as a whole.
What is microsociology?
The study of individual or small-group dynamics within a larger society
What is symbolic interactionism?
A perspective asserting that people and societies are defined and created through the interactions of individuals.
What is the political economy?
The interactions of politics, government and governing, and the social and cultural constitution of markets, institutions, and actors.
What is a theory?
A statement that tries to explain how certain facts or variables are related in order to predict future events
What is natural state?
Hobbes’s conception of the human condition before the emergence of formal social structures.
What are ideal types?
Classic or pure forms of a given social phenomenon (e.g., to some, the United States is an ideal form of democracy).
What are philosophes?
French philosophers during the enlightenment period who advocated critical thinking and practical knowledge
What is organic analogy?
The belief that society is like an organism with interdependent and interrelated parts
What is survival of the fittest?
Spencer’s interpretation of biological principles to justify why only the strong should survive.
What is natural selection?
The biologically based principle that environmental pressures allow certain beneficial traits to be passed on to future generations.
What is evolution
The biological process by which genetic mutations are selected for, and against, through environmental pressures.
What is social Darwinism
Spencer’s assertion that societies evolve according to the same principles as do biological organisms.
What is laissez-faire
A point of view that opposes regulation of or interference with natural processes.
What is collective conscience?
Durkheim’s concept highlighting the totality of beliefs and sentiments that are common to the average person in a society.
What are social facts?
General social features that exist on their own and are independent of individual manifestations.
What does anomie mean?
Durkheim’s term for a state of formlessness that results from a lack of clear goals
What is mechanical solidarity?
Describes early societies based on similarities and independence.
What is organic solidarity?
Describes later societies organized around interdependence and the increasing division of labour.
What is the social action theory?
Parson’s framework attempting to separate behaviours from actions to explain why people do what they do.
What are behaviours
For parsons, the almost mechanical responses to specific stimuli.
What are actions?
For parsons, the results of an active and inventive process.
What is adaptation?
The social system must be able to gather and distribute sufficient resources and adjust to changes in its environment.
What is goal attainment?
The system needs to establish clear goals and priorities.
What is integration?
The system needs to maintain solidarity while allowing the aspirations of subgroups.
What is latency?
The system needs to motivate individuals to release their frustrations in socially appropriate ways.
What is tension maintenance?
Recognizes the internal tensions and strains that influence all actors.
What is pattern maintenance?
Involves socially appropriate ways to displays tensions and strains.
What are manifest functions
The intended consequences of an action or social pattern
What are latent functions?
The unintended consequences of an action or social pattern.
What is natural or physical inequality?
According to Rousseau, inequality based on physical differences established by nature (e.g., physical strength, body size).
What is moral or political inequality?
According to Rousseau, inequality based on human classification of valuable things (e.g., money, social status).
What are dialectics?
Hegel’s view of society as the result of oppositions, contradictions, and tensions from which new ideas and social change can emerge.
What is idealism?
The belief that the human mind and consciousness are more important in understanding the human condition than is the material world.
What is base?
The material and economic foundation for society, made up of the forces of production and the relations of production.
What are forces of production?
The physical and intellectual resources a society has with which to make a living.
What are relations of production?
The relationship between workers and owners.
What is social class?
A group of individuals sharing a position in a social hierarchy, based on both birth and achievement.
What is class conflict?
When the interests of one class are in opposition to another.
What are the proletariat?
Workers who do not own land and must sell their labour.
What are the bourgeoisie?
Owners of the means of production
What is alienation?
Marxist concept to describe the process by which workers lack connection to what they produce and become separated from themselves and other workers.
What is exploitation?
The difference between what workers are paid and the wealth they create for the owner.
What is superstructure?
All of the things that society values and aspires to once its material needs are met (e.g., religion, politics, law).
What is ideology?
A set of beliefs and values that support and justify the ruling class of a society.
What is false consciousness?
Belief in and support for the system that oppresses you.
What is class consciousness?
Recognition of domination and oppression and taking collective action to change it.
What is the Thomas theorem?
Assertion that things people define as real are real in their consequences.
What is verstehen?
Weber’s term for a deep understanding and interpretation of subjective social meanings.
What is formal sociology?
Simmel’s theory that argues that different human interactions, once isolated from their content, can be similar in form.
What is I
Mead’s term for the unsocialized part of the self.
What is Me?
Mead’s term for the socialized element of the self.
What is sympathetic introspection?
Cooley’s concept of the value of putting yourself into another person’s show and seeing the world from their perspective.
What is the looking-glass self?
Cooley’s belief that we develop our self-image through the cues we receive from others.
What is the self-fulfilling prophecy?
A prediction that, once made, causes the outcome to occur.
What is double-consciousness?
Du Boi’s term for a sense of self that is defined, in part, through the eyes of others, resulting in a sense of divided identify experienced by Black Americans.
What is hegemony?
Political and social domination through ideological control and consent.
What is patriarchy?
A pervasive and complex system where men control the social, political and economic resources of society.
What is ruling?
The exercise of power shaping people’s actions.
What is discourse?
A system of meaning that governs how we think, act, and speak about a particular thing or issue.
What is discipline?
The means by which we become motivated to produce particular realities.
What is normalization?
A social process by which some practices and ways of living are marked as “normal” and others are marked as “abnormal.”
What is identity?
Our sense of self, which is socially produced, is fluid, and is multiple.
What is imperialism?
The conquest of land, resources, and people’s labour; the ideas, practices, and attitudes of colonizers.
What is colonialism?
The effects of imperialism, including concrete and ideological effects, within colonized territories.
What is Orientalism
Said’s concept of a discourse of power that creates a false distinction between superior West and an inferior East.
How many tenants does the critical race theory have?
6
What is research?
A systematic approach to gathering data using an agreed-upon set of methods
What is the Indigenous theory?
Understandings of the world generated by Indigenous people and communities
What is the Indigenist theory
Theoretical perspectives that advocate for Indigenous peoples and communities.
What is Inductive logic
A system of reasoning that moves from data to the formation of a theory
What is deductive logic?
A system of reasoning that moves from theory to theory to the formulation of hypothesis for testing
What is a hypothesis?
A tentative statement about a particular relationship (between objects, people, or groups of people) that can be tested empirically.
What are variables?
Characteristics of objects , people, or groups of people that can be measured.
What is operational definition?
A description of something that allows it to be measured.
What is validity?
The accuracy of a given measurement.
What is reliability?
The consistency of a given result
What is a correlation?
A measure of how strongly two variables are related to each other.
What is causality?
Relationship in which one variable causes a change in another variable.
What is spurious correlation?
A false correlation between two or more variables, even though it appears to be true.
What is research population?
A group of people that a researcher wishes to learn something about.
What is a sample?
A subset of the larger research population.
What are research methods?
Strategies used to collect data.
What is a survey?
A research method in which respondents answer pre-set questions.
What are interviews?
A research method involving a research asking a series of questions of participants; they may be structured, semi-structured, or unstructured.
What is participation observation?
Active participation by. a researcher in a researcher in a research setting; combines observation and participation in daily life activities of research subjects (also known as fieldwork).
What is content analysis?
A research method involving analysis of texts.
What is secondary analysis?
A research method involving analysis of existing data.
What is participatory action research (PAR)?
Research that combines an action-oriented goal and the participation of research subjects.
What are mixed methods?
An approach in which both quantitative procedures are used.
What are indigenous research methods?
Research practices that are guided by and respectful of Indigenous ways of knowing, living in, and learning about the world.
What is triangulation?
An approach in which more than one research method is used in an attempt to more fully understand an area of study.
What is culture?
A complex collection of values, beliefs, behaviours, and material objects shared by an group and passed on from one generation to the next.
What is the cultural brain hypothesis?
The theory that culture influenced the size of the human brain.
What are hominid ancestors?
Our human ancestors
What are Homo sapiens
Modern human beings.
What is material culture?
The tangible artifacts and physical objects found in a given culture.
What is nonmaterial culture?
The intangible and abstract components of a society, including values and norms.
What are values?
Cultural beliefs about ideal goals and behaviours that serve as standards for social life and that identify something as right, desirable and moral.
What are norms?
Culturally defined rules that outline appropriate behaviours.
What are folkways?
Informal norms that suggest customary ways of behaving.
What are are mores?
Norms that carry a strong sense of social importance and necessity.
What is taboo?
A prohibition on actions deemed immoral or disgusting.
What is the law?
A type of norm that is formally defined and enacted in legislation.
What is a sanction?
A penalty for norm violation or a reward for norm adherence.
What is ethnocentrism?
The tendency to view one’s own culture as superior to all others.
What is cultural relativism?
Appreciation that all cultures have their own mores, norms, and customs and should be evaluated and understood on their own terms, rather than according to one’s own cultural standards.
What is culture shock?
The feeling of disorientation, alienation, depression, and loneliness experienced when entering a culture very different from one’s own.
What is a symbol?
Something that stands for, or represents something else.
What is language?
A shared symbol system of rules and meanings that governs the production and interpretation of speech.
What is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis?
The assertion that language influences how we perceive the world (also known as linguistic determination.
What is linguistic determination?
Language determination how we perceive the world.
What linguistic relativism?
Language reflects how we perceive the world.
What are micro-expressions?
Largely uncontrollable, instantaneous full-face emotional reactions.
What is subculture?
A group within a population whose values, norms, folkways, or mores set them apart from the dominant culture.
What is counterculture?
A type of subculture that strongly opposes the widely held cultural patterns of the larger population.
What is discovery?
Occurs when something previously unrecognized or reinterpreted is found to have social or cultural applications.
What is invention?
Occurs when existing cultural items are manipulated or modified to produce something new and socially valuable.
What is innovation?
Refers to manipulating existing ideas or technologies to create something new, or to applying the to something for which they were not originally intended.
What is diffusion?
Occurs when cultural items or practices are transmitted from one group to another.
What are cultural universals?
Common cultural features found in all societies.
What is cultural adaptation?
The process by which environmental pressures are addressed through changes in practices, traditions, and, and behaviours.
