midterm Flashcards
Claude Fischer’s “Toward a Subcultural Theory of Urbanism” describes several processes that
explain why large cities have more, and more vibrant/intensive, subcultures. List and explain two
of these processes.
Intergroup conflict: the existence of numerous subcultures within a city can cause the
strengthening of internal boundaries and vibrancy in order to distinguish one’s group from- and
compete with other social groups. Diffusion: the process by which deviant cultural traits expand
beyond the boundaries of their own group.
Georg Simmel describes the unique features of urban “mental life.” Pick two of the concepts that
Simmel introduces for describing this mental life and illustrate them with the help of examples
from Harvey Zorbaugh’s study of the Gold Coast neighborhood.
Simmel describes an ever-increasing objective culture and a much narrower subjective culture.
This means that two people can meet and have very little knowledge and understanding of what
the other’s life is like. Simmel also posits that everyone wants to be seen as interesting, but since
people don’t always have a good understanding of the other person’s world, they can be seen as
quite eccentric to others. The Gold Coast people need to know the right things and the right
people and have the right taste, which is quite a narrow subjective culture. It is also quite clear
that they want to be seen as interesting: they have eccentricities notably in their fashion and want
to be distinguished from the lower strata of society.
Why are there high rates of delinquency in the zone in transition?
The zone in transition is an area with high population density, low income, and high population
turnover. All of these factors contribute to social disorganization and low levels of social
cohesion and trust. As a result, there are fewer mechanisms by which to enforce a moral order,
collective parenting, and keep people from engaging in deviant behavior
Explain competition, invasion, and succession as ecological forces of urban change
Competition, invasion, and succession are processes posited by the Chicago School to explain
urban change, related to the theory of concentric zones. These ecological forces explain the
process whereby members of a neighborhood are invaded by new social groups and new
immigrants and forced to compete for resources. As they are invaded, the former inhabitants
move outwards and are succeeded by the new groups.
Eric Klinenberg discusses four social factors that endangered Chicago seniors during a heat
wave. List and explain three.
Social factors that endangered Chicago seniors were fear of crime. This is because they lived in
poor neighborhoods were crime was more common. Another is the lack of social services offered
by the city. The city often did not put in place programs that would adequately take care of
seniors and keep them company. Seniors are also more frequently isolated today—they often
outlive their social circles and their families live far away and don’t have time to visit or care for
them.
Explain the relationship between the pre-industrial city’s social order (as described by Lyn
Lofland) and deviant/unconventional behaviour.
The pre-industrial city was characterized by its chaos. However, the public nature of punishment
and its visibility in mutilations and brandings led to a kind of “moral class” whereby deviance
could be deterred and deviants excluded. Moreover, the people in the pre-industrial city were
more visibly identifiable by dree, language, transportation, etc. as belonging to a certain
community and thus could more easily be held to account and kept within the conventional moral
order.
In Marxist social theory, what is the connection between urbanization and industrialization?
Urbanization occurs alongside industrialization because it renders obsolete agrarian
economies. Rural people thus move to cities en masse to find work at the very factories
that eliminated their former income. This rapid urban expansion combined with
starvation wages leads to economic segregation in urban areas. The city is a byproduct of
the requirements of industrial capitalism.
What do we learn from Cressy’s study of the taxi-dance hall about the industrial city’s social
order? Outline a connection to at least two aspects of the industrial city.
Cressey’s taxi-dance hall demonstrates the emergence of new social types that is made
possible by the industrial city. Anonymity allows the dancers to detach themselves from
their former lives and engage in this form of employment. It also demonstrates the social
hierarchy among immigrant communities in the industrial city. The cycle of regression
whereby taxi-dancers dance with men whose racial status is lower and are rejected by
those of higher status allows us to see this stratification.
