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| a group of people who share their lives in aggregated and patternistic ways that ditinguish their group from other groups |
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| the systematic or scientific study of human society and social behavior, from large-scale institutions and mass culture to small groups and individual interactions |
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| disciplines that examine the human or social world |
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| Microsociology (Zoom lens) |
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| the level of analysis that studies face-to-face and small-group interactions in order to understand how those interactions affect the larger patterns and institutions of society |
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| Macrosociolgy (wide-angle lens) |
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| the level of analysis that studies large-scale social structures in order to determine how they affect the lives of groups and individuals |
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| women in male-dominated fields experience limits on their advancement |
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| men in female-dominated occupations experience unsually rapid rates of upward mobility |
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| research that translates the social world into numbers that can be treated mathematically; this type of research often tries to find cause-and-effect relationships |
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| research that works with nonnumerical data such as texts, fieldnotes, interview transcripts, photographs, and tape recordings; this type of research more often tries to understand how people make sense of their world |
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| looking at the world in a unique way and seeing it in a whole new light |
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| a quality of the mind that allows us to understand the relationship between our particular situation in life and what is happening at a social level |
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| a sense of disorientation that occurs when you enter a radically new social or cultural environment |
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| approaching the world without preconceptions in order to see things in a new way |
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| one who has the practical knowledge needed to get through daily like but not necessarily the scientific or technical knowledge of how things work |
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| abstract propositions that explain the social world and make predictions about future events |
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- culture of the people
- culture that is well liked by many
- folk or mass culture as opposed to high culture
- cuture with a commercial purpose
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| the theory, developed by Auguste Comte, that sense perceptions are the only valid source of knowledge |
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| a procedure for acquiring knowledge that emphasizes collecting concret data through observation and experiment |
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| the tendency to favor European Western history, culture, and values over other histories, cultures, and values |
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| based on scientific experimentation or observation |
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| term developed by Emile Durkheim to describe the type of social bonds present in premodern, agrarian societies, in which shared tradition and beliefs created a sense of social cohesion |
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| term developed by Emile Durkheim to describe the type of social bonds present in modern societies, based on difference, interdependence, and individual rights |
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| "normlessness;" term used to describe the alienation and loss of purpose that result from weaker social bonds and an increase pace of change |
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| the degree of integration or unity within a particular society; the extent to which individuals feel connected to other members of their group |
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| a political system based on the collective ownership of the means of production; opposed to capitalism |
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| generated by the competition between different class groups for scarce resources and the source of all social change, according to Karl Marx |
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- German social philoshopher, cultural commentator, and political activist
- known as forebear of communism
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| the uneven and often unfair distribution of goods within society |
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| an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and characterized by competition, the profit motive, and wage labor |
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| anything that can create wealth: money, property, factories and other types of businesses, and the infrastructure necessary to run them |
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| workers; those who have no means of production of their own and are reduced to selling their labor power in order to live |
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| owners; the class of modern capitalists who are th employers of wage labor |
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| the sense of dissatisfaction the modern worker feels as a result of producing goods that are owned and controlled by someone else, according to Marx |
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| a political system based on state ownership or control of principle elements of the economy in order to reduce levels of social inequality |
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| the application of economic logic to human activity; the use of formal rules and regulations in order to maximize efficiency without consideration of subjective or individual concerns |
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| secondary groups designed to perform tasks efficiently, characterized by specialization, technical competence, hierarchy, written rules, impersonality, and formal written communication |
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| Max Weber's pessimistic description of modern life, in which the "technical and economic conditions of machine production" control out lives through rigid rules and rationalization |
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| verstehen "to understand" |
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| Weber's term to describe good social research, which tries to understand the meanings that individual social actors attach to various actions and events |
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| the therapeutic branch of psychology founded by Sigmund Freud in which free association and dream interpretation are used to explore the unconscious mind |
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| in Freudian psychology, the drive or instinct that desires productivity and construction |
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| in Freudian psychology, the drive or instinct toward aggression or destruction |
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| the process that causes unwanted or taboo desires to return via tics, dreams, slips of the tongue, and neuroses |
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| the process in which socially unacceptable desires are healthily channeled into socially acceptable expressions, according to Freud |
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| a set of assumptions, theories and perspectives that make up a way of understanding social reality |
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| a paradigm that begins with the assumptions that society is a unified whole that functions because of the contributions of its separate structures |
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| a social institution that is relatively stable over time and that meets the needs of society by performing functions necessary to maintain social order and stability |
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| a disturbance to or undesirable consequence of some aspect of the social system |
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| the obvious, intended functions of a social structure for the social system |
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| the less obvious, perhaps unintended functions of a social structure |
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| Advantages of functionalism |
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- broad reach and inclusion of social institutions
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| Critiques of functionalism |
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- takes the position that only dysfunction can create social change
- provides no insight into any social processes
- static rather than dynamic model
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| a paradigm that sees social conflict as the basis of society and social change and emphasizes a materialist view of society, a critical view of the status quo, and a dynamic model of historical change |
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| Founder of conflict theory |
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| Tenets of Conflict Theory |
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1. a materialist view of society (focused on labor practices and economic reality)
2. a critical stance toward existing social arrangements
3. a dynamic model of historical change |
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| a system of beliefs and values that directs a society and reproduces the status quo of the bourgeoisie |
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| a denial of the truth on the part of the oppressed when they fail to recognize the interests of the ruling class in their ideology |
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| the recognition of social inequality on the part of the oppressed leading to revolutionary act |
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| Marx's model of historical change, whereby two extreme positions come into conflict and creat some new third thing between them |
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| the existing social arrangement in a dialectical model |
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| the opposition to the existing arrangements in a dialectical model |
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| the new social system created out of the conflict between thesis and antithesis in a dialectical model |
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| W.E.B. DuBois's term for the conflict felt by and about African Americans, who were both American (and hence entitled to rights and freedoms) and African (hence subject to prejudices and discrimination) at the same time |
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| those in power in a society |
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| a contemporary form of conflict theory that criticizes many different systems and ideologies of domination and oppresion |
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| practical action that is taken on the basis of intellectual of theoretical understanding |
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| School of Thought: Symbolic Interaction |
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| a paradigm that sees interaction and meaning as central to society and assumes that meanings are not inherent but are created through interaction |
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| a theoretical perspective that assumes organism (including humans) make practical adaptations to their environments. Humans do this through cognition, interpretation and interaction |
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| a theoretical paradigm that uses the metaphor of the theater to understand how individuals present themselves to others |
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| the study of "folk methods" or everyday interactions, that must be uncovered rather than studied directly |
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