Shared Flashcard Set

Details

SOCY 1001 Final- Slide Notecards
CU Boulder, Wadsworth, intro to sociology, socy 1001, final
79
Sociology
Undergraduate 1
12/10/2011

Additional Sociology Flashcards

 


 

Cards

Term
Power
Definition
•Power is the ability to control others, even against their will.
•Having more power than others gives you the ability to get more valued things sooner.
•Having less power than others means you get fewer valued things later.
•The use of power sometimes involves force.
Term
Ways power can be defined
Definition

 

  • Ideological
    • Influencing people's beliefs, norms, and values
    • Constructing a social reality (framing)
  • Economic
    • Control of money, or means to make money
  • Political
    • Control of policies and laws, often through government
  • Military
    • Control of force, but not always through the government

 

Term
Type of Political Systems (2)
Definition
  • State- consists of institutions that formulate and carry out a country's laws and public policies
  • In peforming these functions, the state regulates citizens in civil society- the private sphere of social life
Term
Types of States (3)
Definition
  • Autocracy- absolute power resides in the hands of a single person or party
  • Authoritarian states- sharply restrict citizen control of the state (and thus restrict citizen power).
  • Democracy- citizens exercise a high degree of control over the state by choosing representatves in regular, competitive elections (power is more shared-one person=one vote).
Term
Democracies
Definition
  • Citizens choose representatives in elections and enjoy the freedoms and constitutional protections that make political participation and competition meaningful
    • 46% of countries were democratic in 2004, up from 29% in 1973
Term
Problems with Democracy
Definition
  • corporate influence
  • exclusion of entire populations
  • inequality of representation
  • uninformed manipulated public
Term
Pluralist theory
Definition
  • Different classes, religious groups, ethnic and racial communities compete for state control, but none dominate consistently
  • Most often, politics involves negotiation between competing groups
  • Because no one group is always able to control the political agenda, democracy is guaranteed.
Term
Elite Theory
Definition
  • Elites are small groups that command a society's most influential institutions, including corporations, the executive branch of government, and the military
  • The people who control these institutions make decisions that affect society without regard for elections or public opinion
Term
General overview of work
Definition
  • Existed since the beginning of human life
  • For culture's to survive humans create not only tools, but also institutional and cultural arrangements that envelop such tools:
    • norms governing who should perform given types of work
    • customs
    • laws that define what can be exchanged
  • Work arrangements through cultures are more than "natural"
    • Work arrangements are very variable
Term
Attitudes towards professions and the arrangement of work have changed over time
Definition
  • Today we hold medical doctors and surgeons in high esteem. In medieval Europe surgeons were lumped in with butchers and executioners, as the work of all these trades was viewed as unclean, or stained by blood.
  • The concept of performing labor in exchange for a wage was relatively uncommon into the 18th and 19th centuries 
  • In 2010 in the U.S. there are pet psychologists in every major city
  • As with so many other things, “work” (what it is and what it means) is socially constructed
Term
Greeks history of work
Definition
  • Thought all activities should prepare one for politics; work=mental and physical degradation
    • Better suited for slaves than citizens
    • One exception was farming
Term
History of Work: Growth of Christianity
Definition
  • Work viewed as noble (God worked to create universe, then rested) and form of compensation/redemption for one's sins
  • Warnings against not working were common
    • Work=bring one closer to God
Term
Industrial Revolution; what it brought
Definition
  • Replaced hand tools with power-driven machines
  • Sharp divisions of labor
  • Simpler tasks
  • Wage system
Term
History of Work
Definition
  • The separation of home and work, and changing gender roles
  • Scientific management
  • The rise of unions and the birth of the male breadwinner
  • The fall of unions
  • The organization of work has been influenced by broad cultural and structural changes, and in turn work has influenced other processes, such as marriage and family, gender relations, and stratification.

 

Term
Economy
Definition
  • The institution that organizes the production, distribution, and exchange of goods and services.
Term
Primary Sector
Definition
  • Includes Farming, fishing, logging, mining and other industries in which raw materials are grown or extracted.
Term
Secondary Sector
Definition
  • Raw materials are turned into finished goods; manufacturing takes place. 
Term
Tertiary Sector
Definition
  • Services are bought and sold
Term
Deindustrialization
Definition
  • U.S. economy moves from manufacturing to service
  • Started 1970's
  • Gave rise to two service oriented jobs
    • Highly skilled information/knowledge based occupations
    • Less skilled "support role" occupations
Term
Markets
Definition
  • Markets- social relations that regulate the exchange of goods and services
  • Prices of goods and services are established by how plentiful they are (supply) and how much they are wanted (demand)
  • Markets not just products, but also labor
Term
Free Labor Markets
Definition
  • Free market- labor supply and demand regulate wage levels and other benefits
    • Supply high & demand low = wages low
    • Demand high & supply low = wages high
Term
Regulated Labor Markets
Definition
  • Wage levels and benefits established not just by supply and demand.
    • Also by power of workers and professionals
  • Power driven by bargaining power of workers- individually and collectively
  • Many countries "nationalize" this through a "labor party"
    • U.S. does not
Term
Highest and Lowest Union Membership by Country
Definition
  • Highest = Sweden 82%
  • Lowest = United States 13%
Term
Primary Labor Market
Definition
  • Mostly highly skilled or well educated white males
    • Employed in large corporations that enjoy high levels of capital investment
  • Employment relatively secure, earnings high, benefits generous
  • Primary manufacturing and service jobs are more likely to be unionized
Term
Secondary Labor Market
Definition
  • Contains mostly women and racial minorities
  • Employees tend to be unskilled and lack higher education
  • Employment insecure, earnings low, benefits limited
  • Secondary manufacturing and service jobs less likely to be unionized
Term
Types of Economies: Capitalism
Definition
  • Private ownership of property
    • Individuals and corporations own means of producing goods and services
    • Free to buy and sell property
  • Competition in the pursuit of profit
    • Producers compete to offer goods and services at lowest price
  • Markets for goods, services and labor are unregulated (no government intervention)
Term
Types of Economies: Communism
Definition
  • Public ownership of property
  • Government planning
    • 5 year state plans establish production quotas, prices, and other aspects of economic activity
Term
Types of Economies: Democratic Socialism
Definition
  • Public ownership of certain basic industries (i.e. water and energy, education and health care)
    • Most property privately owned
    • Competition in creating profit is the main motive for business activity (like capitalist societies)
  • Government intervention in market
Term
"Socialism": The Red Herring of 2010
Definition
  • The term "socialism" and the fear associated with it has been used to argue against change in the healthcare system
  • Education, military, criminal justice system, roads, parks, and other social institutions are socialized
Term

Durkheim's Theory of Religion

(collective conscience, profane, sacred, totems, rituals)

Definition
  • When people live together, they share common attitudes and values that operate as a unifying force within society (Collective conscience)
  • When we experience the collective conscience directly, we can distinguish the profane (godless) everyday world from the sacred (religious or transcendent world)
  • Totems- certain designated objects symbolizing the sacred, i.e. cross, buddah, etc
  • Rituals- Public practices to connect us with the sacred, i.e. praying
  • Function of rituals and religion as a whole is to reinforce social solidarity
Term
Durkheim's Theory and the Super Bowl
Definition
  • Commercials have evolved into a ritual
Term
Criticisms of Durkheim (3)
Definition
  1. Overemphasizes religion's role in maintaining social cohesion, when religion often incites social conflict (especially in religiously heterogeneous areas)
  2. Ignores the fact that when religion increases social cohesion, it often reinforces social inequality
  3. Religion has also been essential to many social movements of equality
Term
Weber: Routinization of Charisma
Definition
  • Weber's term for the transformation of the unique gift of divine enlightenment into a permanent feature of everyday life
  • Involves turning religious inspiration (the otherworldly) into a stable social institution with defined roles (interpreters of the divine message, teachers, offering ushers, etc)
Term
Secularization Thesis of Religion
Definition
  • Some have argued that religious institutions, actions, and consciousness are on the decline
  • Critics:
    • There has been a religious recovery in the U.S. over the past 30 years
    • Survey evidence shows religion in the U.S. is resilient
    • Belief in life after death has been slowly increasing since the 1970s
    • Significant growth in beliefs
Term
Revised Secularization Thesis
Definition
  • Suggests that worldly institutions break off from the instituion of religion over tme
  • Result = religion governs an ever smaller part of most people's lives and becomes largely a matter of personal choice
Term
Supply Side Religion
Definition

Theories:

  • Worldly institutions break off from the institution of religion over time
  • As religion becomes unregulated, more unique "religious products" become available, and are "marketed" more vigorously
  • More vigorous marketing = higher participation
  • *Used to explain growth of religion in U.S.
Term
Why is the U.S. an exception to the "Wealth and Importance of Religion" graph?
Definition
  • Outlier because of seperation of chruch and state couple with capitalism
  • U.S. socially constructs need for religion
Term
(ALL CARDS BELOW THIS NEED TO BE REVISED TO SEE IF ANYTHING IS MISSING)
Definition
Term
Sociological Developments in the World of Recreation and Leisure: The Decline of Public Life
Definition
  • Tech and leisure. Way we enjoy leisure alone.
  • The development of technology has led us to be more partially antisocial
  • More connected = less contact
Term
Sociological Developments in the World of Recreation and Leisure: The commodification of recreation and leisure
Definition
  • Initially snowboarding was invented to rebel skiing. Others joined along with it not solely because they like it but rather because it was a way to rebel against their parents. 
  • Media however modernized and marketed it
Term

Sociological Developments in the World of Recreation and Leisure: Formalizing Recreation

Definition
  • How we've put activities we do into socially constructed categories
    • Overprogrammed kids- what was stickball is now little league
Term
Media Monopolization
Definition
  • In 1983 there were 50 media conglomerates
  • In 2003 there were 5 which control well over 90% of all media outlets
  • How we are being entertained is driven by the decisions of a relatively small group of very wealthy (primarily) white men
  • Average leisure & media for US=28hrs/week
Term
Demography
Definition
  • Population studies
  • Changes in size and/or age structure of population
  • The role of birth cohorts
  • Patterns of migration and urbanization
Term
The Population "Explosion"
Definition
  • 10,000 years before the birth of Christ there were only about 6 million people in the world.
  • By the time Christ was born, world population had risen to 250 million, and it increased to some 760 million by 1750.
  • The number of humans reached 1 billion in 1804 and 5 billion in 1987 and 7 billion in 2011.
Term

Demographic Transition Theory

(Crude Death Rate, Crude Birth Rate)

Definition
  • Explains how changes in fertility and mortality affect population growth from preindustrial to postindustrial times
  • Crude death rate= annual # deaths/1,000 people in population
  • Crude birth rate= annual # live births/1,000 women in population
Term
Demographic Transition Theory: 4 Stages
Definition
  1. Pre-industrial era - crude birth rates and crude death rates were high and population growth was slow.
  2. Early industrialization - crude death rates fell, population growth was rapid.
  3. Later in industrialization era - values about having children changed, the crude birth rate fell, resulting in slow growth again.
  4. Postindustrial era - crude death rate has risen above the crude birth rate in many societies
Term
Globalization
Definition
  • Process in which people + institutions across the planet are becoming increasingly aware of and dependent on one another
Term
The Sources of Globalization
Definition
  • Technology - commercial jets, telephone, fax, and email/internet
  • Politics -countries that are politically isolated have less integration with the rest of the world.
  • Economics- industrial capitalism is always seeking new markets, higher profits, and lower labor costs.
Term

Big Issues in Globalization:

Transnational Corporations (5)

Definition
  1. Depend increasingly on foreign labor and foreign production.
  2. Emphasize skills and advances in design, technology, and management.
  3. Depend increasingly on world markets.
  4. Depend increasingly on massive advertising campaigns.
  5. Are increasingly autonomous from national governments.
Term

Big Issues in Globalization:

Global Commodity Chains

Definition
  • A worldwide network of labor and production processes whose end result is a finished commodity.
Term
What drive commodity chains? (3)
Definition
  • Low labor costs
  • Fewer industrial and environmental regulations
  • Cooperative political structures
Term
Global Commodity Chains: Pros
Definition
  • Supplies jobs to poor countries
  • Provides cheaper goods
  • Expand markets
Term

Global Commodity Chains: Cons

Definition
  • New jobs are low quality and weak
  • Old livelihood may disappear
  • Environmental degradation
  • Resources for transportation
  • Can corrupt governments
  • Generally increases inequality
  • Loss of jobs in wealthier nation
Term

Big Issues in Globalization:

Cultural Homogenization

Definition
  • Different nations and cultural groups become more and more similar
  • Some countries encourage visitors, others are more cautious
Term
McDonaldization
Definition
  • The spread of the principles of fast-food restaurants, such as efficiency, predictability, and calculability, to all spheres of life.
  • McDonald’s now does most of its business outside the United States.
  • McDonaldization has come to stand for the global spread of values associated with the United States and its business culture.
Term
Cultural Imperialism
Definition
  • The cultural domination of one country by another
Term

Theories of Global Inequality:

Modernization theory

Definition
  • Global inequality results from dysfunctional characteristics of poor societies
Term

Theories of Global Inequality:

Dependency Theory

Definition
  • Economic underdevelopment is the result of exploitative relations between rich and poor countries
Term
Neoliberal Globalization
Definition
  • A policy that promotes private control of industry, minimal government interference in the running of the economy, the removal of taxes, tariffs, and restrictive regulations that discourage the international buying and selling of goods and services, and the encouragement of foreign investment.
Term
Democratic Globalization
Definition
  • Research shows democracy lowers inequality and promotes economic growth:
    • Makes it more difficult for elite groups to misuse their power.
    • Increases political stability and provides a better investment climate.
    • Encourages broad political participation.
Term
Global Warming
Definition
  • With the spread of markets comes more “modernization”, resulting in higher carbon dioxide emissions (the U.S. is currently responsible for 20-24% of all emissions)
  • Difficult issue of “who should modernize”
Term
Industrial Pollution
Definition
  • Tends to be concentrated in less developed countries, often due to exploitation by wealthier countries
  • Environmental Racism
Term
Environmental Racism
Definition
  • Pile environmental dangers on the disadvantaged
    • Especially racial minorities
    • Those living in less developed nations
Term

Collective Action

(Nonroutine + routine collective action)

Definition
  • Collective Action- when people act in unison to bring about or resist social, political, and economic change
  • Nonroutine collective action- takes place when usual conventions cease to guide social action and people bypass established structures.
  • Routine collective actions- follow established patterns of behavior in existing social structures
Term
Social Movements
Definition
  • Enduring collective attempts to change part or all of the social order by means of rioting, peititoning, striking, demonstrating, and establishing lobbies, unions, and political parties
Term
Solidarity Theory
Definition
  • Holds that social movements are social organizations that emerge when potential members:
    • Mobilize resources
    • Take advantage of new political opportunities
    • Avoid high levels of social control by authorities.
Term
Resource Mobilization
Definition
  • Refers to the process by which social movements crystallize due to increasing organizational, material, and other resources of movement members.
Term
Political Opportunities
Definition
  • Political opportunities for collective action and social movement growth occur during election campaigns, when influential allies offer insurgents support, when ruling political alignments become unstable, and when elite groups become divided and conflict with one another.
Term
Social Control
Definition
  • Authorities seek to contain collective action, including:
    • co-optation (coming together)
    • concessions (giving up)
    • coercion (collective action to behave)
Term
Union Density
Definition
  • The number of union members in a given location and time as a percentage of nonfarm workers
  • It measures the organizational power of unions
Term
Frame Alignment
Definition
  • The process by which they shape what they say based on the group that they are trying to target
Term
Encouraging Frame Alignment (3)
Definition
  1. Social-movement leaders reach out to organizations that contain people who are sympathetic to the cause.
  2. Movement activists stress popular values that have not been prominent in the thinking of potential recruits.
  3. Social movements can stretch their objectives to win recruits who aren’t initially sympathetic to their aims. 
Term
(THE FOLLOWING TERMS ARE FROM PAST TESTS THAT WE WILL NEED TO KNOW + STILL NEED TO DEFINE)
Definition
Term
Critical Thinking
Definition
  • going through society and life taking thought as to why and how certain things and people perform as they do, and how we as a society and/or individual view them.
Term
Beginner's Mind
Definition
  • Ability to see things without any preconceptions as if you were seeing it for the first time
Term
The Sociological Imagination
Definition
  • allows us to understand the larger historical picture and it's meaning in our own lifes
  • connection of personal experience and social structure (look at current world situation and how our lifes compare to it; why and how certain things happen)
Term
Social Constructionism
Definition
  • Where we are and who we are around affect how we perceive everything in the world
Term
Research Methods
Definition
  • experiment- controls the conditions; artificial. Create your own situation so you in the end in control of the outcome.
  • Survey- a lot of info quickly; snapshot of people at a time and place. 
  • Ethnography- Rather than viewing it from the outside, you become apart of the inside. Risks the possibility of becoming adapt to culture, but gain respect and trust.
Term
What Sociology is Good for
Definition
  • Satisfying Curiosity
  • Explaining Social Problems (or Successes) 
  • Advising Public Policy Before It’s Made
  • Assessing Public Policy After It’s Made
Supporting users have an ad free experience!