Theories Flashcards
Describe key features of the Interactionist theory on Culture and Identity. (And deviance too.)
Strengths and weaknesses too please.
Key features: Interactionists base their theory on the image of active humans, rather than a powerful society as functionalists do. Culture is maintained through the use of signs and signals. Society is a social construct, it is fiction and is kept alive through interaction between individuals. (Basically it’s a made up concept which is used so much it’s considered real.)
Interactionists say that nothing in society is real, everything is socially created, like how we can understand eachother, and how we each adopt roles which we deem our “jobs”.
Deviance is a socially constructed concept. There is no such thing as an inherently deviant act.
Identity: Identity is shaped by the way others react to you. You end up thinking of yourself and acting the way others think of you.
Labelling/Stigmatisation Lemert (1967) argues that there are two types of deviance, primary and secondary. Primary is where an act breaking norms is committed, but is tolerated, like parking on double yellow lines or not returning a shopping cart. Secondary is where the deviance is no longer accepted, like taking class A drugs.
Agrees with functionalism that society does have roles however they are much more flexable, for example a married couple would develop their own interpretations of the roles of husband and wife.
Strength: Interactionism draws our attention to the issues of labelling in society.
Weakness: While they have created a good theory of devience, they don’t explain why the deviant acts occur in the first place!
Weakness 2: Don’t explain why differant crimes are committed, like why do some people choose to take cannabis and others choose to murder?
Describe these key terms:
Alienation
Class consciousness
Exploitation
Value consensus
Folk devil
Alienation: The separation of a person from his humanity by the exploitations of capitalism.
Class consciousness: The awareness of the classes of society and their importance to the overall picture.
Folk devil: a group shunned by the media which in turn gives them a bad image. This can eventually develop into a moral panic, which is where a large movement against the group takes place.
Exploitation: Marx vehemently asserted that a society of classes will result in one class taking advantage of (or exploiting) another.
Value consensus: shared values within a large group.
Give key features/description of Marxism .
Give a strength of Marxism.
And a weakness. c:
- Dominant classes create ideology.
- This is then seen as natural by the lower classes.
- Lower classes can’t better themselves.
- Media spread this ideology.
- Pop culture is seen as inferior and used to amuse and divert the masses from inequality.
- Deviant subcultures are a natural response to class conflict and are inevitable.
Strengths: Marxist sociologists have found plenty of evidence to support the fact that the ruling classes control culture and law making
Weaknesses: Marxists cannot explain middle class subcultures like hippies.
Weakness 2: Marxists have been criticised for believing a communist society would be free of crime.
Key features of Feminism? Strength and weakness too please.
- Culture is created and disseminated through the institutions of the state and the media by men.
- Female Control Theory: Females are controlled more strictly by their parents and prevented from going out and joining ‘visible’ subcultures more than males.
It’s argued that girls responded by creating a bedroom culture, a culture centred around romance, fashion, and the girls bedroom.
- Key phrases: Patriarchy, gender role socialisation, glass ceiling, domestic violence, control theory, bedroom culture, sexualisation.
- Strength: Feminists have brought attention to females in subcultures and deviance.
- Strength two: Feminists have highlighted the malestream nature of sociology.
WEAKNESSES!!: Females control theory paints all women as passive victims of male oppression which is not true.
Straight white feminists have been accused of ignoring racism and homophobia WHILE USING THEIR IPHONES!
Key Features, Strengths and Weaknesses of Functionalism approach to Education?
What did Parsons say?
What did Durkheim say?
What did Davis and Moore say?
KF:
Schools are a secondary agent of socialisation and play a large role in teaching a person value consensus and social solidarity.
Parsons: Bridge between family and work. Education is a mini society.
Durkheim states that education is used for: Social solidarity (history and english gives us a shared sense of identity). Teaching us key skills for work/core values. Durkheim also said that education was a vital part of the organic analogy and that with a successful school system, society will see more success.
Role Allocation: Davis and Moore say that education allocates the roles in society to students through their exam scores and qualifications. It allows a person to see where their strengths are and which jobs require these strengths.
+ Functionalism helps us see how crucial education is to society, like how it reveals which roles are best suited to a student based on their exam scores.
-Ignores differences in attainment and success between social groups based on class, gender and ethnicity.
What is the Marxist approach to education?
Bowles and Gintis argue that there is a close relationship between social relationships in the workplace and in education.
Other Marxists would say that:
- It transmits the idea that capitalism is a just and fair system.
- It decides who gets the best jobs and who gets the worst jobs.
- School mirrors the workplace through its hierarchical structures – teachers’ give orders and pupils obey. Pupils have little control over their work – a fact of life in the majority of jobs. Schools reward punctuality and obedience and are dismissive of independence, critical awareness and creativity – this mirrors the workplace expectations. The hidden curriculum is seen by Bowles and Gintis as instrumental in this process.
Hidden Curriculum- Subliminal learning, children learning things like authority, obedience.
