Week 1 - Sociological Thinking Flashcards
Define sociology - according to textbook
The systematic study of society and social interaction
Systematic means disciplined and concentrated
What does it mean to think sociologically?
hint: think, why, how and who?
Non-individual explenations about the social world, how it works and why it is this way and how it differentially impacts the lives of individuals and groups
What is sociological thinking based upon?
What are the four veins of sociological thinking?
Knowledge, experience, and theories about people, society and the social worlds we live in + questioning those assumptions
Conceptual, theoretical, empirical and analytical
Define the levels of analysis?
Macro: dynamics of institutions or whole societies
Micro: intimate social dynamics, face to face interactions
Define retrification?
The way in which abstract concepts, complex processes or mutable social relations come to be thought of as things (ex: distinction between indie and society)
Define figuration?
there is no individual without society and vice versa
Soci perspective: Critical Feminist - explain?
who’s the thinker?
Marx, Gilman
The moral/political conscience of socio - judges obstacles people face and pushes for accessibility
Critical sociology: analysis and assessment, inequalities and forms of domination
Soci perspective: Funtionalist - explain?
who’s the thinker?
Emile Durkheim
society is composed of many different parts which all serve an important purpose
Suicide as a product of anomie (or normlessness) - redifining the private act as a failure to feel social solidarity
- different rates among diff pops
- cannot be explained usin indv factors
- religious correlation
Soci perspective: symbolic interactionism - explain? who’s the thinker?
Herbert Blumer, Erving Goffman
Sometimes reffered to as “micro-sociology”
meaning + interpretation of social action/behaviour
reality is created by people through their interactions
Define social solidarity?
social force that binds people, can exert pressure/influence on people indirectly, society can act as a preventitive measure
The sociological imagination - explain? who’s the thinker? give examples?
Connections between self and society - how people understand they own + other’s pasts in relation to history and social structure
Individual problems become formulated as social issues - indie probs are often soci probs but are formulated in indie terms (ex: fair and lovely)
3 factors of sociological imagination? provide example
3 key factors
- History: always changing and evolving
- Biography: own vs. members of the same society
- Social structure: not equal offers diff oppertunities
Overrep of indigenous in prispop despite small percent of canadian pop
What is the “definition of a situation”?
What is a sign vehicle?
Thinker: WI Thomas
If people define a situation as real, it is real in its consequences
Involves many sources of info
ex: a teen who is defined as a deviant may act deviant
Sign vehicles: the symbolic traffic between people
