SOCI LECTURE 11

Question 1

Theories of Deviance

Answer 1

• Culture Perspective
• Interactionalist Perspective

Question 2

Culture or Subculture Theorists 1st example

Answer 2

Looks at the conflict between the subculture group and the overarching group

Cultural conflicts from various different cultures arrive from three different scenarios
- When people migrate
- During a takeover
- On a border

Question 3

The second example of Albert Cohen’s Reaction Theory

Answer 3

• Many individuals are ill-equipped and fail to meet middle-class standards and experience status frustration
• As a result, they create their own sub-culture with their own values and norms
• Results in an inversion of middle-class norms

(teachers imposing middle-class values on people who don’t want them)

Question 4

Third Miller’s (1958) Lower-class Culture Theory

Answer 4

• the lower class is in natural discord with middle-class values

To attain status among peers, the lower classes from their own subculture
- getting in trouble
- showing toughness
- demonstrating street smart
- searching for excitement fatalistic

Question 5

Problems with the structural and subculture perspectives

Answer 5

• Put another way –> there is no bridge between macro and micro forces
• Does not explain how people from the same families are subject to different structural and subculture forces

Solution: The Interactionalist Perspective
- teases out the socio-psychological forces
- explains why people from the same background can turn out very differently

Question 6

What is Drift Theory (MATZA, 1964)

Answer 6

Drift theory suggests that movements into deviant culture happen very slowly and overtime
- initially individual battles between drifting and conformity
- then a dual life is maintained
- eventually, the choice is made, if the choice is made then the old circle of life slowly drifts away

Question 7

Labelling Theory (Matza 1964)

Answer 7

• some people are more likely to be caught than others
• the individuals who are caught are labelled deviant
• the interaction between society and those labelled deviant can set off a chain reaction that has significant negative consequences consequences

Question 8

what are the three steps in creating deviants?

Answer 8

1. the act must be defined by the audience as deviant
2. the actor must be defined as a deviant person
3. the actor must accept the label and define themselves

Question 9

Why do people choose not to be deviant?

Answer 9

• Strong social bonds and connections
• Deviants don’t have much to lose