Week 2

Question 1

What is Functionalism?

Answer 1

A theoretical perspective that sees society as an organism. It has differentiated parts that fulfill varying functions in the social body, seeing society as evolving from simple to complex.

Question 2

Who coined Functionalism?

Answer 2

Herbert Spencer

Question 3

What is Empiricism?

Answer 3

The theory that all knowledge is based on experience and that the senses are the ultimate source of human knowledge. The natural world operates according to natural laws.

Main British empiricists: John Locke and David Hume

Question 4

What is Ontology?

Answer 4

The nature of being or reality

Question 5

What is Epistemology?

Answer 5

The study of how we KNOW our reality.

Question 6

What was Durkheim’s key concern/question?

Answer 6

“what causes social stability and solidarity?”

Question 7

What was Durkheim’s main sociological theory?

Answer 7

Structural Functionalism, which is the belief that society is an integrated system

Question 8

What was Marx’s key concern/question?

Answer 8

“what divides society?”

Question 9

What was Marx’s main sociological theory?

Answer 9

Conflict Theory, which is the essence of society is conflict and change

Question 10

What was Weber’s key concern/question?

Answer 10

concerned about the impact of values and their meaning on social action

Question 11

What was Weber’s main sociological theory?

Answer 11

Interpretive Sociology, which is the focus on meaning and the context of human behavior

Question 12

What is the main difference between Durkheim’s beliefs and Marx’s beliefs?

Answer 12

Durkheim believed in holism, but cooperation

Marx believed in holism, but conflict

Question 13

What is Rationalism?

Answer 13

The belief that logic and rational thoughts make things real

Question 14

What is Idealism?

Answer 14

The belief in metaphysics, meaning even if we can’t experience something with our 5 senses, it can still be real

Question 15

Who created the bridge to symbolic interactionism?

Answer 15

Weber

Question 16

What is Social Evolution?

Answer 16

The belief in the idea that society is evolving over time, for the better. The idea that population growth and evolutionary processes lead to differentiated social structures. It is a key theory within Functionalism.

Question 17

Who coined “survival of the fittest”?

Answer 17

Herbert Spencer

Question 18

The 4 universal stages of social evolution:

Answer 18

Primitive societies with casual political cooperation

Militant societies with rigid hierarchical control

Industrial societies (political hegemony collapses and markets emerge)

Self-regulating markets where the state withers away (complex relationship between economy and polity)

Question 19

The 3 requisite needs of Functionalism:

Answer 19

Regulatory – structures that regulate between the internal organism and the external environment (ie, border control)

Operative – structures that meet internal system needs (ie, cultural or educational)

Distributive – structures that carry needed information and goods throughout the system (ie, transportation, distribution of goods)

Question 20

Differentiated structures (AKA: Functionalism) requires what 3 things?

Answer 20

Specialization

Integration

Coordination

Question 21

How are the needs of differentiated structures (AKA: Functionalism) met?

Answer 21

Through social institutions

Question 22

What is Structural Functionalism?

Answer 22

A Functionalist approach that uses a Positivist theoretical perspective

Question 23

What is the main problem in a Functionalist society?

Answer 23

The coordination between structures and the stability of our systems.

Question 24

What is “society” according to Durkheim?

Answer 24

Society is a social product created by the actions of individuals that then exerts a coercive social force back on those individuals