Transcript Essentials of Sociology Fourth Edition

Essentials of Sociology
Fifth Edition
Chapter Four
Social Structure
& Social Interaction
This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law:
any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network; preparation of any derivative
work, including the extraction, in whole or in part, of any images; any rental, lease, or lending of the program.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
1
The Macrosociological
Perspective : Social Structure
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
2
The Macrosociological Perspective


Social structure refers to the typical patterns of
a group.
 Social structure guides our behavior.
Social location, or a person’s location in
the social structure, creates the variances.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
3
Culture

Culture is the broadest framework that
determines what kind of people we
become.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
4
Social Class

Social class—large
numbers of people
who have similar
amounts of
income, education,
and prestige.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
5
Social Status

Status—the position that an individual
occupies.
Ascribed Status is involuntary
 Achieved Status is earned

Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
6
Roles


Roles—the behaviors, obligations, and
privileges attached to a status.
The difference between a role and a status:
 You occupy a status.
 You play a role.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
7
Groups and Institutions

A group—consists of
people who regularly
and consciously
interact with one
another.

Social institutions—
the means that each
society develops to
meet its basic needs.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
8
Societies

Society- people who share a culture and a
territory.

Your life would vary in each society
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
9
The Microsociological
Perspective : Social Interaction
in Everyday Life
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
10
Personal Space

Distance zones
Intimate
Personal
Social
Public
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
11
Role Performance



Everyday life brings
with it many roles.
Role conflict—what is
expected of us in one
role is incompatible with
what is expected of us
in another role.
Role strain—when the
same role presents
inherent conflict.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
12
Ethnomethodology

Ethnomethodology—the study of how
people use commonsense understandings to
get through everyday life.

Ethnomethodologists explore background
assumptions.

Background assumptions—your ideas about the
way life is and the way things ought to work.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
13
The Social Construction
of Reality


Thomas Theorem—
“If people define
situations as real,
they are real in their
consequences.”
Our behavior does not
depend on the
objective existence of
something, but on the
subjective.

The social
construction of
reality—society and
life experiences
define what is real.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
14
The Need For Both
Macrosociology &
Microsociology
Our understanding of behavior would be
incomplete without one or the other.
Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
15
Chambliss Study

Two groups of high school boys studied by
sociologist William Chambliss. Both groups
attended Hanibal High School.
8 middle-class boys who came from “good”
families (Saints)
 6 lower-class boys who were seen as headed
down a dead-end road (Roughnecks)

Copyright © 2004 by Allyn and Bacon
16