Sociology

Sociology

1. Education

   • Functionalists
     • FIrstly, People, Do, Matter, Definitly
       • F - Firstly - Functionalism  P - People - (Talcott) Parsons  D - Do - Davis & M- Matter - Moore  D - Definitly - Durkhime 
       • Parsons - Meritocracy
         • Education selects children into the appropriate roles
           • Through Meritocracy
             • Meritocracy - the best rises to the top Merit - from latin mereō rewarding the best  cracy - Anchent greek κράτος, kratos 'strength, power' 
       • Davis and Moore, Stratification
         • Society needs winners and loosers
           • System of Unequal reward to motivate people to train for the top positions within society  (The American Dream) 
           • Stratifcation is educaitons natural selection process
             • Determaning what subjects students take and eventually what Job and Soceital role
       • Durkhime - Secondary Socialisation
         • You recive your 'Primary Socialisation" from your parents. Durkhime stated that the role of education was to help and idividual achive 'Social Solidarity'.  This involves teaching the children social norms, and how to function in mainstream society. 
         • Bowles and Gintis: Hidden Curriculum
           • The Hidden Curriculum  This ties into secondary socialisation as the hidden curriculum explains how schools educate social solidarity.  They are taught to accept hierarchy  (Head teacher, Head of year, Head of [subject], teachers, reception, maintenence)  Pupils are motivated to do boring work by the prospects of grades Much like workers being motivated to work with the reward of money. School day is broken down into segmants similar to a typical working day. Rewarding students for subserviance and folling rules to prepare them for obediance and compliance in the workplace. 
           • Hiarchy normalised
             • School day broken down to mirror working days
               • Obediance Rewarded
                 • Pupils motivated to do boring work with grades
           • Marxists
         • Education passes on norms and values
   • Marxists
   • Femenists
   • Reaserch Methods

2. Crime and Deviance

   • Left and Right realism
     • Left
       • Lea and Young
         • Relative Deprovation
           • With the amount of pressure from capitalist society to consume, people are given a sence of deprovation relative to their social standing and those with more.  For example, the middle class feel deprived next to the higher classes. The rich feel deprived next to the Super Ritch.  This mainly effects working class people who make up for feeling deprived through illigitamate means. 
       • Structuralists
         • Structuralists focus on inequality (mainly wealth)  if we reduce social inequality then we reduce and therefore prevent crime 
         • Interventionists
           • Interventionists focus on targeting specific groups more likely to commit crime such as pupil premium students e.g. Herts Youth Club on Tuesday luches. 
       • Social and Community Approaches
         • These are politicially hard to sustain becasue they are necessarily long term and governments and councils change roughly every 4 years. Situational crime prevention is reactie and deals with existing crime whereas social/community approach attempts to develop communities where crime is less likely to develop. 
     • Right
       • Wilson and Herrnstein
         • (1985) claim there's a biological predisposition to crime in some individuals, but the right socialisation can train them away from it.  They argue that LONE PARENT FAMILIES are more likely to have 'criminal children' because they have incomplete socialisation.  W&H also argue that people have free will and have rationality and reason. Therfore crime is a DECISION. An individual weighs the risk to rewards and depending if the rewards outweigh the risks crime will be commited. (this links to Murray (1997)) 
         • Murray (1997)
           • Murray claims that the higher the risk of going to prison, the less likely people are to commit crime. 
           • Wilson
             • Kelling and Wilson
           • Zero tolerance
   • Functionalism
     • Durkhime: Deviance and Social change
       • Durkheim (1897) said deviance allows for social change to occur.  Durkhime and other functionalists argue society needs change to stay healthy and stable.  If society reacts positvely to deviant behaviour, it begins a process where the deviant behaviour will no longer be deviant in the future.  However crime becomes dysfunctional when the level of crime is either too high or too low.  Too high and it threatans social order and control  Too low, and there is no social change.
       • Cohen: Safety Valve
         • Albert Cohen (1966) argued forms of deviance such as prostitution provide a safety valve for releasing tension without threatening social stability.  Secondly deviant behaviour such as civil disobedience, protests and truancy is used as a warning device by society to identify emerging social problems
     • Robert merton
       • Crime is a response to faling to achive society's cultural goals
         • Merton (1966) concluded from his American studie that the majority of people shared the same societal goals. However not everyone had the same acess or opportunity to achive these goals.  The main cultural goal is 'The American Dream'  The main means of achiveing these goals are through the education system. When individuals fail or are excluded this creates anomie  Anomie - A lack of values, and a feeling of normlessness. 
         • Strain Theory
           • When an individual is unable to achive society's goals due to factors beyond their control  Discrimination or Deprovation It Causes a STRAIN  witch leads to deviant behaviour. Merton identified five adaptations to Strain  Conforming, Innovating, Ritual, Retreating, Rebelling 
           • Conforming
             • People who still try to achive the main cultural goals through legitimate means
           • Innovating
             • People who fail at the standard rout to success innovate to find alternative and deviant means of reaching success and wealth (crime)
           • Ritual
             • People who cannot achieve society's goals and have stopped trying they may still act legitimately because they're used to the ritual of society. 
           • Retreating
             • People who Reject the main cultural goals and the means of achieving them may retreat from society. e.g:  Dropping out of school  Drinking to excess  Drug abuse 
           • Rebelling
             • Instead of retreating, people may rebel against society, and engage in protest and revolution to try and change it.
   • Marxism
   • Globalisation
     • As globalisation has become more mainstream, it has become more easy for criminals to acsess this and form multi national crime operations.  This includes Human trafficking (Modern Slavery)  and Cyber crime  For example, a crime can be commited in America and the affects will be in the UK
     • Human trafficking
     • Cyber Crime
   • Labelling theory of crime
   • Victims, Provention and punishment
     • Victim Statistics
       • From 'Crime in England and Wales 2009/10
       • Men 2X likely to become victims of violence
         • Men 16-24 experiance most violence
           • More women are afraid of becoming victims of crime
             • 7% of women are victims of domestic violence
               • Men 4%
                 • Lower-income households are most likely to experiance domestic violence
               • Members of ethnic minority groups are twice as likely to be victims of robbery
                 • Mixed ethnic groups are most likely to be victims of violent crime
     • Surveillance
       • Surveillance is used to detect and prevent crime
       • Michel Foucault (1977)
         • Argued that prisons exert their disciplinary power by using surveillance.  Not just physical serveillance CCTV, Patrolling Guards Much of it is 'Self Survailance'  Foucault belived that if prisoners know that they might be being observed, they will behave all the time, just in case.  Although this may work in prisons it doesn't work in the outside world, as CCTV servailance is at an all time high and crime rates have not reduced. 

3. Families And Households

   • Reaserch Methods
     • Ethics
   • Functionalism
     • Marxism
       • Engels: Inheritance
         • Families serve an economic function.  Keeping the wealth within the bourgeoisie 
         • The nuclear family emerged with capitalism
           • Does this mean that the nuclear family is a result of the massive changes that came about during the industrial revolution. before that people lived in tribal communities that were self sufficiant. 
       • Zeretsky
         • Family creates the Illusion of power for the disempowered proletariat. The family is a form of femai oppression to reduce worker frustration and legitimise exploitation. The housewife is a huge benefit to the capitalist system, as she cares for the the man, his health, 'his' home, 'his' children all so he can be more productive. This theory is also called 'Dads Armchair' or 'King Of The Castle' due to the male breadwinner having complete control over the home to subsadise for having no power outside the home. 
       • Contempuary Marxism
         • The family as a unit of consumption
     • Durkhime: Social Solidarity
       • The Family is crucial in creating value consensus and the intergration of individuals into soiety. This is also referred to as Primary Socialisation. 
       • Parsons: Family socialisation and interaction process
         • Family has two irreputible functions
           • Primary Socialisation
             • Accepting and learning norms and values.  'Factories for producing citisens' 
           • Stabalisation of adult personalitys
             • Adult support and security Emotionally containing relationships
     • Murdock: Social structure
       • in 1949 Murdock studied 250 different societies with a vast variation of cultures among them.  He discovered some variation of the nuclear family within all of them. This lead him to Identify the four basic funtions of society
       • Sexual
         • Safe adult sexual relationships  Regulation of sexual relationships 
       • Reproductive
         • Babies, new members of society  within a structured unit (care) 
       • Economic
         • Pooled recorces provide for all members
         • Educational
           • Norms and Values are passed to children, witch supports wider society.
     • Critisims of functionalist theories
       • Family Idealism
         • Morgan (1975) notes that Murdock makes no reference to disharmony, developmental damage, under resourced parents, negative or prolematic family relationships. 
         • It's all very 50's
           • Patriarchal context ('honey I'm home)  since the 60s, what about conflic, class, violence, exploitation of women
           • Postmodern context changes things
             • Family is not inclusive enough or flexible enough. what has the traditional institution of the family solved? Gender roles are not helpful.
             • Overlooking negative aspects
               • Functionalist overlook negative aspects making their view look narrow and weak

4. Media