Sociologists- Theory and Methods Flashcards
Quantitative Research
Durkheim ( Funct)
- Used the comparative method in his study of suicide which relied on analyzing official statistics.
Quantitative Research
Oakley( Fem)
-The positivist approach is a masculine approach – regards science as more important that furthering the interests of the people it researches.
Quantitative Research
Graham
-Questionnaires and Interviews give a distorted and invalid picture of women’s experience.
Qualitative Research
Douglas ( interpretivist)
-criticized the research carried out by Durkheim as he argued official statistics are not objective facts. He suggested the official statistics were instead social constructs
Qualitative Research
Glaser and Strauss
-Reject the positivist idea that research involves a beginning with a fixed hypothesis. They argue research should begin with an open mind, not a set idea.
Qualitative Research
Oakley ( fem)
-Feminist approach to research – value committed, researchers involvement, aims for equality and collaboration
Qualitative Research
Willis (neo-marx)
-Use of observation to study the lads from a neo-Marxist perspective.
Functionalism- Durkheim
Mechanical solidarity – society had a strong collective conscience
Functionalism- Parsons
Value consensus, social order – society must have socialisation and social control. There are societal needs – adaption, goal attainment, integration, latency.
Functionalism- Merton
– assumes everything is functional, may not all work together well, some things may be functional for one group and dysfunctional for another.
Marxism- Marx
Class conflict – owners of means of production (bourgeoise) vs. class of labourers (proletariat). Bourgeoise exploit proletariat to make a profit. Ideology of the upper classes is transmitted in society. Proletariat becomes alienated. Eventually, proletariat will realise their exploitation, rise up and overthrow capitalism in a communist revolution.
Marxism- Gramsci
Hegemony – ideology of the upper, dominant class. For revolution to happen, the proletariat need to develop dual consciousness – they need to develop a counter hegemony
Marxism- Althusser
Ideological State Apparatus – institutions in society spread the ideology of capitalism. Repressive state apparatus – armies of men who coerce the working class to accept capitalism.
Feminism- Oakley
Liberal feminists distinguish between sex and gender. There are cultural differences in the understanding of gender. Sexist attitudes are socially constructed. Therefore social action can bring about change in ideas of gender roles.
Feminism- Firestone
Patriarchy develops due to women’s biological capacity to bear children, so they become dependent on men for support.
Feminism- Greer
Radical feminists believe in separatism – there needs to be a new culture of female independence. We should have matrilocal households, as heterosexual households leads to sleeping with the enemy.
Feminism- Barrett
In order to overthrow capitalism, we must overthrow the ideology of familism which encourages traditional gender roles.
Feminism- Butler
We need to embrace post-structuralism to help understand that all women are different and have difference experiences of oppression.
Social Action- Weber
Different types of action – instrumentally rational, value rational, traditional, affectual. Wrote the ‘protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism’ using these ideas to understand their behaviour. Contrasted to Marx’s ideas about capitalism.
Social action- Mead
Symbols help us to understand social behaviour. In order to know how to act we take on the role of the other we put ourselves in another’s shoes to see how they see us.
Social action- Goffman
Dramaturgical analogy. We act in different ways depending on the situation – the front stage and the back stage through impression management.
Social action- Giddens
Structuration theory – structure and agency comes together – structure changes based on action.
Social action- Garfinkel
Created breaching experiments to understand the meaning behind social action. Developed the idea of reflexivity and indexicality.
Globalisation, Modernity and Post-Modernity- Beck
We live in a risk society – post modernism brings fragmentation and risk with globalisation.
Globalisation, Modernity and Post-Modernity- Lyotard
There is no such thing as real knowledge – post-modern society has many competing meta-narratives – we no longer know what truth is.
Globalisation, Modernity and Post-Modernity- Baudrillard
We live in hyper reality. We can’t distinguish between media life and real life.
Globalisation, Modernity and Post-Modernity- Foucalt
We now reject scientific knowledge as truth – we can’t judge what is true or not so we can’t use it to improve society. Other theories are meta narratives – just big stories that attempt to explain everything but they can’t so are unhelpful.
Sociology and social policy- Murray
Believes policy to support families and welfare should be reduce as it creates social problems.
Sociology and social policy- Wilson and Kelling
Production of zero tolerance policies to reduce criminal behaviour in society.
Sociology and social policy- Worsley
A social problem is some piece of social behaviour that causes public friction and or private misery and calls for collective action to solve it.
Sociology and social policy- Durkheim
Functionalist take a positive approach. They take a cautious approach to policy – believe you should fix one issue at a time.
Sociology and science- Popper
Popper believes that lots of sociology is unscientific because it is unfalsifiable. It could be scientific if hypotheses were produced and they were tested.
Sociology and science-Kuhn
Sociology doesn’t have agreed paradigms making it a pre-science.
Objectivity and Value Freedom- Weber
Values should be used in research to guide the research, to interpret data. Recognises that sociologists are humans and can’t be fully objective.
Objectivity and Value Freedom- Becker
Sociologists should take the stance of the ‘underdogs’. They should research less known groups and support groups whose voiced need to be heard.
Objectivity and Value Freedom- Marx
Scientific in the sense he wanted to reveal the truth behind the exploitation and alienation in capitalism to help deliver a good society.
Objectivity and Value Freedom- Gouldner
Sociologists should take the stance of those who are fighting back – it should be committed to ending oppression.
