1.3 Social Identity and Change- Theorists

Question 1

Crompton

Class Identities

Answer 1

suggests that occupation is a good general measure that can allow us to define simple class groupings; working, middle and upper class.

Question 2

Crompton

Changes to the nature of work

Answer 2

• Decline in traditional manufacturing industries
• A rise of service industries such as banking, computing and a range of lesser-status service jobs

Question 3

Goldthorpe

New Working Class

Answer 3

developed new forms of identity;
* privatised or home-centered
* instrumental- work was a means to an end- the creation of a comfortable home and family life- rather than work being an end in and on itself.

Question 4

Devine

class identity

Answer 4

suggsted that there were still important differences between the new working class and the middle classes. the former for example still retained a strong sense of being working class.

Question 5

Brooks

Middle Class ocupational identity

Answer 5

Managers involved in the day to day running of private and public companies- an identity that combines career progression, decision making, power and control over others and the organisation of work routines.

Question 6

Self and Zealey

distribution of wealth

Answer 6

• 21% of UK’s total wealth is owned by the wealthiest 1%
• 7% of the nation’s wealth is owned by the least wealthy 50%

in india a similar pattern of income inequality emerges;
* the top 10% of wage earners earn 12 times more than the bottom 10%
* 42% of India’s 1.2B population live on around 1.25$ a day

Question 7

Davies et al

world wealth distribution

Answer 7

the world’s richest 1% own 40% of the total global wealth. of this 1%, 60% live in just two countries- USA and Japan

Question 8

connell

gender identities

Answer 8

argued that we are not born men and women, we become men and women through social construction of gender identities. gender refers to social characteristics given to each sex.

Question 9

Lips

gender identities

Answer 9

argued that deifferences in male and female identities do not occur naturallyfrom biological differences. gender identities differ historically and cross-culturally, which means that they are both learnt and relative.

Question 10

Rongsu etal

gender

Answer 10

psychological gender differences; men are interested in things and women are interested in people

Question 11

Statham

Gender Identities

Answer 11

Found that by the age of 5, most children have a clear gender identity.

Question 12

Sharpe

Gender Identities

Answer 12

Found that British girls’ identities in the 1970s revolved around “love, marriage, husbands, children, jobs and careers, more or less in that order.”

Question 13

Billington et al

gender identities

Answer 13

Argues that the Mass Media has traditionally portrayed Masculinity as dominant and Femininity as subordinate, so women were generally represented in a narrow range of social roles in it.

Question 14

Connell

two dominant gender identities

Answer 14

1. Hegemonic Masculinity; where traditional forms of masculinity are based on a variety of physical and mental characterisitics. for examples; men are encouraged to adopt a body shape that, ideally, emphasises physical strength. Mental characteristics include ideas of men as leaders, providers, being unemotional, cool, calm, rational and so on.
2. Emphasized femininity;relates to the idea that female identities were traditionally defined by how they could accomodate the interests and needs of men. The dominant identity was one that matched and complemented hegemonic masculinity. women were regarded as essentially passive, emotional beings whose identity was expressed in the service of others.

Question 15

Kitchen

emphasised femininity

Answer 15

called emphasised femininity as a ‘complicit femininity’ because it is defined by male needs and desires.

Question 16

Schauer

alternative masculinities

Answer 16

• subordinate masculinity; lesser forms of masculinity, particularly for men who are unable or unwilling to perform hegemonic masculinity, such as those with physical disabilities
• subversive masculinitiy; involve an alternative masculinity that challenges and undermines hegemonic masculinity.
• complicit masculinity; newly feminised masculinities such as the ‘new man’ ; men who combine paid work with their share of unpaid housework and childcare, taking on aspects the traditional feminine role. this type of masculinity sees women as equals and occurs, (connel argues) because as women have become more powerful, male identities have begun to change.
• marginalised masculinity; refer to men who feel like they have been pushed to the margins of family life due to long-term unemployment- they no longer feel able to perform what they see as the traditional masculine roles of money earner and family provider.

Question 17

Connell

gender identities

Answer 17

Argues that masculinity today has experienced change, saying that in addition to the hegemonic masculinity there is now New Man, Metrosexuals and Homosexuals.

Question 18

Mort

gender identities

Answer 18

Highlights the appearance of metrosexual men - heterosexuals who are concerned with their image primarily.

Question 19

Willott and Griffin

Marginalised Masculinities

Answer 19

noted this type of masculinity developing among the long-term unemployed working class as traditional beliefs about ‘the good family man’ providing for wife and kids clashed with an inability to provide for their partner and children as traditional working class occupations disappeared.

Question 20

Oakley

4 main ways children socialised into gender roles

Answer 20

• by manipulation; stressing the importance of appearance to girls and of being brave to boys.
• by canalisation; channeling children’s time and attention into different activities, such as the girl helping her mother cook while the boy plays sport with his father
• by verbal apellation; how children are spoken to; for example, telling a girl she is pretty reinforces attractiveness in females is the most important.
• by different activities: what children see their parents and others doing leads to ideas about what is appropriate for each sex, for example cooking and cleaning are for women.

Question 21

Oakley

1- contingent femininities

Answer 21

Contingent femininities; framed and shaped by male beliefs, behaviours and demands:
* normalised identities; involves women learning to play a secondary role to men- as mothers, girlfriends, partners, etc.
Chambers et al argues that such femininities continually struggle with the problem of ‘producing a femininity which will secure male approval

• sexualised identities are made through male eyes and fantasies. in these types of identities women are sexual objects that exist for male gratification

Question 22

Oakley

2- Assertive Femininities

Answer 22

reflect the changing position of women in many societies. they involve breaking free from traditional ideas about femininity, but not completely setting themselves apart from men.
Froyum suggests that assertive femininities are adopted to ‘resist male power without actually threatening to overthrow such power’.

different types of assertive femininities include:
* Girl Power identities: Hollows suggests that these emphasise ‘sex as fun’ and the importance of female friendships. these identities represent a way of coping with with masculinity, but older women are excluded from this identity.
* Modernised Femininities; relate to a slightly older age group. these locate new found female economic and cultural power within the context of family relationships. the assertive aspect here is the desire for personal freedom and expression -what McRobbie termed individualism, liberty and entitlement to sexual expression- within the context of traditional gender relationships.
* Ageing Femininities; assert the right of elderly women to be fashionable, active and sexual beings.

Question 23

Oakley

3- Autonomous Femininities

Answer 23

Involves competition with men, on female terms. Evans points to a female individualism as part of a ‘new gender regime that frees women from from traditional constraints’, such as pregnancy and childcare. They are likely to be-
* highly educated
* successful
* professional middle class
* career-focused
they also tend to form non-commital heterosexual attachments. these may involve marriage but are unlikely to involve children.

Question 24

Ossorio

ethnicity

Answer 24

argues the simple notion of race is wrong- there is no solid scientific evidence of genetically different racial groups.

Question 25

The Centre for Social Welfare Research

ethnicity

Answer 25

stated that for all of us, identity is in some sense ‘ethnic’ in that we have diverse origins…related to how we are perceived and treated by others.

Question 26

Winston

ethnicity

Answer 26

suggests that ethnic identities develop when peope ‘see themselvesas being distinctive in some way from others’ because of a shared cultural background and history.

Question 27

Song

ethnicity

Answer 27

claims that ethnic identities are often expressed in terms of distinctive markers such as a common ancestry and ‘memories of a shared past’

Question 28

Drury

ethnicity

Answer 28

in some Asian families there is family conflict with girls reporting having secret boyfriends

Question 29

Berthoud

Answer 29

Some evidence points to lower emphasis placed on long-term
partnerships and especially on formal marriage by British African
Caribbeans. Matrifocalism

Question 30

Wimmer

ethnicity

Answer 30

important aspect of ethnic identities is how they are defined in relation to other ethnic groups by constructing a sense of difference, which establishes boundaries for a particular identity.

Question 31

Anderson

Older People

Answer 31

while an average woman of the mid 18th century could expect to die 12 years before her last grandchild was born, a woman of the 1970s could expect to live 25 years after the birth of her last grandchild.

Question 32

Aries

children

Answer 32

has argued that childhoos in the modern sense did not exist in the Middle Ages.

said that the idea of childhood is a modern invention, or ‘social construction’.

Question 33

Hood-Williams

children

Answer 33

argues that there are three types of adult control on children:
* Space- children are required to stay within specific spaces. in traditional societies children often had greater freedom to roam over a wider area. in western societies, concern over safety related to dangers such as traffic or danger from other people ‘stranger danger’ means that children are watched over more and kept closer to home.
* time- control over children’s time; when they go to sleep, when they eat, etc. adults also decide when children are old enough for certain activities.
* bodies- what children wear, their hair length, the way they sit, talk, etc.

Question 34

Postman

Answer 34

argued that childhood had changed again with the growth of television, computers and videos. these mean children are exposed to the adult world earlier, they cannot be kept innocent of the adult world of sex, violence, etc. Postman cites increases in crime by children, and the tendency for children to dress and behave more like adults.

Since Postman first raised these concerns, the growth of the internet, and the relative ease with which adult images and content can be accessed, has probably shortened the period of childhood innocence for many children.

Question 35

Einstadt (functionalist)

teenagers

Answer 35

viewed the teenage years as a difficult period because they involve status anxiety- industrial societies emphasis achieved not ascribed statuses and therefore young people feel the pressure to achieve.

thus, young people responded by relying on their peer-groups therefore tending to form a youth culture, but einstadt saw this as functional since it helped people through the transition to adult life. some breaking of norms was seen as testing the boundaries of acceptable behaviour as young people sought to establish their status and identity.

Question 36

Ritzer

Mcdonaldisation/americanisation

Answer 36

western ideas and culture are making societies around the world increasingly similar like fast food brands

Question 37

Rampton

changing identitites

Answer 37

suggests that identity construction in postmodern societies is ‘something that involves assembling, or piecing together a sense of identity from many changing options.’

Question 38

Peele

changing class identities

Answer 38

argues that recent global economoic changes have resulted in a blurring of traditional class identities. we can see this in cultural changes in taste and consumption.

Question 39

Savage

Changing Class Identities

Answer 39

argues that although people still use class categories as a source of identity, the meaning of these categories has changed. greater emphasis is put on the individual, rather than collective experiences; this undermines the importance of class, which is by itself nature collective.

Question 40

Stuart Hall’s Essay

The Question of Identity

Answer 40

Stuart Hall suggests in this essay that we have now reached a third historical stage in the development of ideas about identity,
the stage of the postmodern subject.

During the period of the Enlightenment subject (16th to 18th centuries in Europe), it was thought that each person had a unique individual and indivisible identity.

Then, during the 19th century, the sociological subject, seeing the individual citizen as enmeshed in a network of relationships with the modern state developed.

Now, however, identities are increasingly fragmented; people no longer have a single, unified idea of who they are and can have several possibly conflicting identities. Hall relates this change to globalisation, the rise of new social movements, including feminism and identity politics, and of surveillance. These can lead to a defensive reassertion of national identity (for example, against immigrants), to
minority ethnic groups identifying with the cultures of their countries of origin, and to new and hybrid identities. Identities have
been decentred.

Hall’s is a strong argument for postmodern ideas about identity. This has been criticised for not recognising that older sources of identity, such as social class, are still important.

Question 41

Benyon

Changing Gender Identities- crisis of masculinity

Answer 41

argues that contemporary global spcieties are experiencing a crisis of masculine identity caused by a combination of:
* long term unemployment
* the loss of traditional male employment in manufacturing industries
* lower educational achievement relative to girls
* the rise of female friendly service industries

Question 42

Mac an Ghaill

changing gender identities

Answer 42

Claims that hegemonic masculinity may be experiencing a “crisis of masculinity” because of the decline of traditional industries and resulting unemployment.

Question 43

Sharpe

changing gender identities

Answer 43

Suggests that young women are becoming more assertive about their rights and are now more likely to rank education above marriage and career above family in their lives.

Question 44

Wilkinson and Sharpe

changing gender identities

Answer 44

Say that the increasing participation and success of women in the world of paid work mean that traditional notions of female identity are being abandoned.

Question 45

Collier

gender socialisation

Answer 45

Notes that lads’ magazines still objectify women in an explicitly sexual fashion.