Content Analysis of Song Lyrics
You will conduct a “mini” analysis of the lyrics of two songs of your choice. These songs should be thematically similar (for example, the lyrics focus on gender, race, crime, or any other sociologically interesting topic that we’ve discussed), but should have been released at least 20 years apart. The purpose of this assignment is to demonstrate your ability to uncover sociologically interesting themes that are reflected within cultural media and to apply theoretical concepts from class. It is also to demonstrate your ability to reflect on broader processes of social and change that are reflected through popular culture. You will then briefly discuss (5-6 pages, double-spaced) the relevance of the themes that you uncover to our class discussions on such topics as culture, media, and inequality based on gender, race, sexual orientation or socioeconomic status making sure to compare the lyrics to each other.
Content analysis is a methodological tool used in sociology to study the social meanings embedded in the content of recorded human communication. Songs are an example of such communication. Through the process of content analysis, sociologists are able to uncover the relevance of both manifest content (what the speakers are actually saying) and latent content (what’s implied in those manifest statements).
Components of the Assignment:
You should first identify the two songs that you want to analyze. I want you to print out a copy of the lyrics, which you will “content code” by hand. This process, which should be guided by your sociological imagination, involves identifying patterns, as well as manifest and latent content. You should make a copy of your content coded lyrics and hand them in separately in class on the due date.
Your paper should begin with an introduction, explaining the relevance of your song lyrics to one or more of the topics we have addressed in class so far and summarizing your findings.
Next, you should briefly discuss the content coding process and what you found.
In the remainder of the paper, I want you to analyze your findings in terms of the topics, theories and concepts that we have discussed in class, drawing explicitly from our readings, films and class lectures.
End with a conclusion summarizing the broad themes that have been revealed through your analysis.
I already have a song that I have in mind, find one other song that you could compare and contrast. The song is by Lil baby ” The Bigger Picture” for the lyrics fond the clean version to analise. here’s a youtube link to the song
CHAPTER 1
The Sociological Imagination:
An Introduction
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
Paradox
• A successful sociologist makes the familiar
strange.
• Click here to watch the paradox animation:
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What Is Sociology?
• Sociology is the study of human society.
• Thinking like a sociologist requires you to reconsider your
assumptions about society and question what you have taken for
granted in order to better understand the world around you.
1.1 The Sociological Imagination
The Sociological Imagination
•
Sociological imagination: The ability to
connect the most basic, intimate aspects
of an individual’s life to seemingly
impersonal and remote historical forces.
•
This term, coined by C. Wright Mills,
encourages questioning and “making the
familiar strange”.
What Are the True Costs and Returns of
College?
• College graduates earn about $1,500,000
more over their lifetimes than people with
only a high-school education.
• If the benefits of college are due to the
learning that takes place, why not learn on
your own free of charge?
Getting That “Piece of Paper”
• If higher education is really about getting a
“piece of paper,” then why not simply print
out a fake diploma?
• There are strong informal mechanisms, such
as networks of alumni, by which universities
protect their status.
Asha Rangappa Interview
•
Asha Rangappa, the dean of
admissions at Yale Law School,
discusses the role that class plays in
acceptance.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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Discussion Questions
• Why are you in college?
• Did the people around you, including your friends and family, expect
you to go to college?
• Do you think this is the same for everyone? Why or why not?
1.2 What Is a Social Institution?
What Is a Social Institution?
•
Social institution: A complex group of interdependent positions that,
together, perform a social role and reproduce themselves over time
•
The legal system
•
The labor market
•
The educational system
•
The military
•
The family
Social Structures That Make Up College
• The legal system
• The primary and secondary educational systems
• The Educational Testing Service and ACT
• The wage labor market
• The English language
1.3 The Sociology of Sociology
Auguste Comte
•
Comte believed that the best way to understand society is by determining
the logic or scientific laws governing human behavior, which he called
“social physics.”
•
Positivism: Initially called “social physics,” this approach to sociology
emphasizes the scientific method to study the objectively observable
behavior of individuals irrespective of the meanings those actions have
for the subjects themselves.
Harriet Martineau
•
Martineau was the first person to translate
Comte’s written works into English and one of
the earliest feminist social scientists.
•
She addressed topics ranging from the
education of children to the relationship
between the federal and state governments.
Karl Marx
•
Marx proposed the theory of historical
materialism, which identifies class conflict
as the primary cause of social change.
•
From his surname the term Marxism (an
ideological alternative to capitalism)
derives, and his writings provided the
theoretical basis for Communism.
Max Weber
•
Weber emphasized subjectivity.
•
To truly understand why people act the way they do, a sociologist must
understand the meanings they attach to their actions.
•
Verstehen: German for “understanding”
•
Interpretive sociology: A type of scholarship in which researchers imagine
themselves experiencing the life positions of the social actors they want to
understand rather than treating those people as objects to be examined
Émile Durkheim (1 of 2)
• Durkheim wished to understand how society holds together and
how modern capitalism and industrialization have transformed the
ways people relate to one another.
• He proposed that division of labor didn’t just affect work and
productivity, it also helped determine a society’s form of social
solidarity.
• He is famous for his study in which argues that anomie is a main
Émile Durkheim (2 of 2)
• Anomie: A sense of aimlessness or despair that arises when we can
no longer reasonably expect life to be predictable; inadequate social
regulation; normlessness.
• Positivist sociology: The approach to sociology that emphasizes the
scientific method as an approach to studying the objectively
observable behavior of individuals irrespective of the meanings of
those actions for the subjects themselves.
Georg Simmel
• Simmel proposed a formal sociology, or a sociology of pure numbers
(for instance, how a group of two is different than a group of three).
• His work was influential in the development of urban sociology and
cultural sociology, and his work with small-group interactions served
as an intellectual precedent for later sociologists who came to study
microinteractions.
American Sociology
•
Early American sociology became prominent at the University of Chicago.
•
The “Chicago School” perspective focused on empirical research built on
a central belief that people’s behaviors and personalities are shaped by
their social and physical environments.
•
Robert Park
•
Louis Wirth
•
George Herbert Mead
•
Charles Horton Cooley
W. E. B Du Bois
•
Du Boise was the first African American to receive a PhD from Harvard
and the first sociologist to undertake ethnography in the African
American community.
•
Double consciousness: A concept conceived by W. E. B. Du Bois to
describe the behavioral scripts, one for moving through the world and
the other incorporating the external opinions of prejudiced onlookers,
that are constantly maintained by African Americans.
Jane Addams
•
Addams founded Hull House, where the ideas of the Chicago School were
put into practice and tested.
•
Addams was a prolific author on both the substance and methodology of
community studies and her work at Hull House was influential in the
development of the Chicago School’s theories, yet she was never afforded
the same respect as the majority of her male contemporaries.
Functionalism
• Functionalism: The theory that various social institutions and
processes in society exist to serve some important (or necessary)
function to keep society running.
• Talcott Parsons was a leading theorist of functionalism in the mid20th century.
Conflict Theory
•
Conflict theory: The idea that conflict between competing interests is the
basic, animating force of social change and society in general.
•
According to conflict theorists, inequality exists as a result of political
struggles among different groups (classes) in a particular society.
•
Although functionalists theorize that inequality is a necessary and
beneficial aspect of society, conflict theorists argue that it is unfair and
exists at the expense of less powerful groups.
Symbolic Interactionism
•
Symbolic interactionism: A micro-level theory in which shared meanings,
orientations, and assumptions form the basic motivations behind
people’s actions.
•
The groundwork for symbolic interactionism was laid by Erving Goffman’s
dramaturgical theory of social interaction, which used the language of
theater to describe the social facade we create.
•
According to Goffman, we make judgments about class and social status
based on details of how people present themselves to others.
Postmodernism
•
Postmodernism: A condition characterized by a questioning of the notion
of progress and history, the replacement of narrative within pastiche, and
multiple, perhaps even conflicting, identities resulting from disjointed
affiliations.
•
Social construction: An entity that exists because people behave as if it
exists and whose existence is perpetuated as people and social
institutions act in accordance with widely agreed-on formal rules or
informal norms of behavior associated with that entity.
Midrange Theory
• Midrange theory: A theory that attempts to predict how certain
social institutions tend to function.
• Midrange theory is neither macrosociology nor microsociology.
• The key to midrange theory is that it generates falsifiable
hypotheses—predictions that can be tested by analyzing the real
world.
Feminist Theory
•
Feminist theory: A catchall term for many theories with an emphasis on
women’s experiences and a belief that sociology and society in general
subordinate women.
•
Feminist theorists emphasize equality between men and women and want to
see women’s lives and experiences represented in sociological studies.
•
Feminist sociologists remain interested in how power relationships are defined,
shaped, and reproduced on the basis of gender differences.
Discussion Questions
• Compare functionalism and conflict theory.
• How would the two differ in their understanding of inequality?
1.4 Sociology and Its Cousins
Differentiating Sociology from Other Fields
•
History and anthropology tend to focus more
on particular circumstances.
•
Psychology and biology examine things on a
more micro level than sociology does.
•
Economics is an entirely quantitative discipline.
•
Political science focuses on only one aspect of
social relations: power.
Julia Adams Interview
•
Historical comparative sociologist
Julia Adams discusses the difference
between historians and sociologists.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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1.5 Divisions within Sociology
Microsociology and Macrosociology
• Microsociology understands local interactional contexts, focusing
on face-to-face encounters and gathering data through participant
observations and in-depth interviews.
• Macrosociology looks at social dynamics across whole societies or
large parts of them and often relies on statistical analysis to do so.
Review & Discuss
Review Question 1
• Which of the following is an example of using one’s sociological imagination?
a. being in unfamiliar surroundings and imagining being in a more comfortable
place
b. creating different hypotheses to explain an individual’s behavior
c. creating a story to explain unfamiliar social customs
d. being puzzled by how people in another country greet one another and then
thinking about why they might do it that way
Review Question 2
• Social identity is
a. a construct that no longer has meaning in the postmodern era.
b. a collection of social roles that a person might fill.
c. a way in which individuals define themselves in relation to groups.
d. determined by the social group into which a person is born.
Review Question 3
• The Chicago School of American Sociology emphasized the
importance of
a. the social and moral consequences of the division of labor.
b. the environment in shaping people’s behavior and personalities.
c. heavy statistical research.
d. none of the above
Review Question 4
• Sociology is distinct from other academic disciplines in its attempt to
a. embrace quantitative and qualitative research.
b. ask probing questions about how societies function.
c. detect patterns in how different societies handle or respond to
similar phenomena.
d. examine human interaction on the micro level.
Review Question 5
• Which of the following is an example of a study that might be undertaken by a
macrosociologist?
a. assessing how people choose where to sit on a public bus
b. observing customers’ responses to being greeted upon entering a store
c. conducting a statistical analysis of when professional men and women choose
to start families
d. examining how men and women react to riding in an elevator with an infant
Discussion Question
• Imagine that a historian and a sociologist are both studying the civil
rights movement in the United States. How might their approaches
differ?
Sociology on the Street
• The neighborhood where you grow up exerts a significant effect on
the rest of your life. How did your house, neighbors, street, and
town influence you?
• Watch the Sociology on the Street video to find out more:
https://digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Credits
• This concludes the Lecture PowerPoint presentation for Chapter 1 of You May Ask Yourself, 7e Full Edition.
• For more resources, please visit digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
CHAPTER 2
Methods
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
Paradox
• If we successfully answer one question,
it only spawns others. There is no
moment when a social scientist’s work
is done.
• Click here to watch the paradox
animation:
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2.1 Methods
danah boyd Interview
•
danah boyd uses many research
methods in her work. She explains
how studying teen behavior both
online and offline enhances her
research.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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Ethnography
• danah boyd’s research is an example of ethnography.
• Ethnography: A qualitative method of studying people or a social
setting that uses observation, interaction, and sometimes formal
interviewing to document behaviors, customs, experiences, social
ties, and so on.
The Scientific Method
• Scientific method: A procedure involving the formulation, testing,
and modification of hypotheses based on systematic observation,
measurement, and/or experiments.
• Theory: An abstracted, systematic model of how some aspect of the
world works.
Types of Research Methods
•
Research methods: Approaches that social scientists use for investigating
the answers to questions.
•
Methods can be quantitative or qualitative.
•
Quantitative methods: Methods that seek to obtain information about
the social world that is already in or can be converted to numeric form.
•
Qualitative methods: Methods that attempt to collect information about
the social world that cannot be readily converted to numeric form.
Causal Relationships
• Both quantitative and qualitative research approaches provide ways
to establish a causal relationship between social elements.
• Causal relationship: The idea that one factor influences another
through a chain of events; such a dynamic is different from two
factors being merely associated or correlated, in which case they
may appear to vary together but that could be due to chance or a
third factor causing both.
2.2 Research 101
Approaches to Research
• A deductive approach to research
•
starts with a theory.
• An inductive approach to research
•
develops a hypothesis.
•
starts with empirical observation.
•
makes empirical observations.
•
works to form a theory.
•
analyzes the data collected
•
determines if a correlation exists
through observation to confirm,
by noticing if a change is observed
reject, or modify the original
in two things simultaneously.
theory.
The Research Cycle
Correlation
•
Correlation or association:
When two variables tend to
track each other positively or
negatively.
•
Sometimes, a natural
experiment can be used to
further explore a correlation.
Natural Experiment
•
Natural experiment: Something
that takes place in the world that
affects people in a way that is
unrelated to any other preexisting
factors or their characteristics,
thereby approximating random
assignment to treatment or
control groups.
Causality
• Causality: The notion that a change in one factor results in a
corresponding change in another.
• Three factors are needed to establish causality: correlation, time
order, and ruling out of alternative explanations.
• Reverse causality: A situation in which the researcher believes that
A results in a change in B, but B in fact is causing A.
• Reverse causality makes it important to establish time order.
Variables
• Dependent variable: The outcome the researcher is trying to
explain.
• Independent variable: A measured factor that the researcher
believes has a causal impact on the dependent variable.
• It’s possible to have more than one independent variable; the most
important one is the key independent variable.
Hypothesis Testing
• Hypothesis: A proposed relationship between two variables, usually
with a stated direction.
•
The direction of the relationship refers to whether variables move in the
same direction (positive) or in opposite directions (negative).
• A study to test any hypothesis begins with operationalization.
• Operationalization: How a concept gets defined and measured in a
given study.
Validity, Reliability, Generalizability
• Good research should be valid, reliable, and generalizable.
• Validity: The extent to which an instrument measures what it is
intended to measure.
• Reliability: The likelihood of obtaining consistent results using the
same measure.
• Generalizability: The extent to which we can claim our findings
inform us about a group that is larger than the one we studied.
Experimenter Effects
• White coat effect: The phenomenon wherein a researcher’s
presence affects their subjects’ behavior or response, thereby
disrupting the study.
• Reflexivity: Analyzing and critically considering our own role in, and
effect on, our research.
•
What is your relationship to your research subjects?
Shamus Khan Interview
•
Shamus Khan explains that most
sociologists working in elite
departments like his come from a
privileged background.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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Mitchell Duneier Interview
•
Mitchell Duneier talks about the
challenges of doing ethnography, the
responsibilities of the researcher, and
the ethics of ethnographic research.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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Feminist Methodology
• Feminist methodology is a set of systems or methods that:
•
treat women’s experiences as legitimate empirical and theoretical
resources.
•
promote social science for women (think public sociology, but for a specific
half of the public).
•
take into account the researcher as much as the overt subject matter.
• The point of adopting feminist methods isn’t to exclude men or
male perspectives: It’s not instead of; it’s in addition to.
Types of Data Collection
•
Participant observation
•
Interviews
•
Survey research
•
Historical methods
•
Comparative research
•
Content analysis
•
Experimental methods
Participant Observation
• Participant observation: A qualitative research method that seeks
to uncover the meanings people give their social actions by
observing their behavior in practice.
• This type of sociology typically involves a significant time investment
because the participant observer must gain access to a given
community, learn its local norms and logic of behavior, and then
watch social dynamics unfold.
Interviews
•
Interviews are another common form of gathering qualitative data. We
can learn how and why people do things by asking them about it.
•
Interviews can be structured, semi-structured, or unstructured.
•
Unstructured, open-ended interviews allow subjects to share intimacies
and details, but they typically take more time and require more
conversational skills from the interviewer.
•
For semi-structured interviews, researchers develop a specific set of
questions to address with all respondents in a relatively fixed sequence.
Surveys (1 of 2)
•
Survey: An ordered series of questions intended
to elicit information from respondents.
•
Population: An entire group of individual persons,
objects, or items from which samples may be
drawn.
•
Sample: The subset of the population from which
the researcher is actually collecting data.
Surveys (2 of 2)
• Representative sample: The idea that a particular slice of social
observation—a sample of survey respondents, an ethnographic
research site such as an organization, or a batch of social media
posts—captures in an accurate way the larger set (or universe) of
those phenomena that it is meant to stand in for.
• If you don’t use a sample and instead collect information on the
entire population, the survey becomes a census.
Case Study
• Case study: an intensive investigation of one particular unit of
analysis in order to describe it or uncover its mechanisms.
• The main drawback to case studies is that they may not broadly
generalizable.
• The major benefit of case studies is that they provide very detailed
information.
Historical Methods
• Historical methods: Research that
collects data written from reports,
newspaper articles, journals,
transcripts, television programs, diaries,
artwork, and other artifacts that date
back to the period under study.
Comparative Research
•
Comparative research: A methodology by which two or more entities
(such as countries), which are similar in many dimensions but differ on
the dimension in question, are compared to learn about the differences.
•
The general approach to comparative research is to find cases that match
on many potentially relevant dimensions but vary on just one, allowing
researchers to observe the effect of that particular dimension.
Content Analysis
• Content analysis: A systematic analysis of the content rather than
the structure of a communication, such as a written work, speech,
or film.
• Manifest content refers to what we can observe.
• Latent content refers to what is implied but not stated outright.
Experimentation
• Experimental methods: Methods that seek to alter the social
landscape in a very specific way for a given sample of individuals
and then track what results that change yields; they often involve
comparisons to a control group that did not experience such an
intervention.
Duncan Watts Interview
•
Duncan Watts describes his experimental
research on the Matthew effect. He
hypothesizes that it is not just the quality of
something that determines its success, but
also its luck in catching on via peer-to-peer
influence.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
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2.3 Ethics of Social Research
Golden Rules of Research
1. Do no harm. Often, we try to design research projects so that subjects
will encounter no more risk than that associated with everyday life.
2. Get informed consent. Subjects have a right to know they are part of a
study, what they are expected to do, and how the results will be used.
3. Ensure voluntary participation. People have a right to decide if they want
to participate in your study. They must be allowed to drop out at any
point with no penalty.
Review & Discuss
Review Question 1
• Which of the following describes the deductive approach to research?
a. A researcher makes empirical observations, and based on these observations, develops
a theory.
b. A researcher develops several hypotheses to explain a correlation observed between
two factors.
c. A researcher establishes causation and then develops a theory to explain it.
d. A researcher starts with a theory, forms a hypothesis, makes observations, and then
analyzes the data to confirm, reject, or refine the original theory.
Review Question 2
• What is a moderating variable?
a. a factor that is positioned between the independent and dependent
variables but does not affect the relationship between them
b. a factor that affects only the independent variable in a hypothesis
c. a factor that can replace the dependent variable in a hypothesis
d. a factor that affects the relationship between the independent and
dependent variables
Review Question 3
• A thermometer that consistently gives readings that are five degrees
cooler than the actual temperature is
a. valid but not reliable.
b. reliable but not valid.
c. neither reliable nor valid.
d. both reliable and valid.
Review Question 4
• Which of the following data collection methods are commonly used in
social research?
a. comparative study, survey, interview
b. historical method, participant observation, case study
c. natural experiment, double-blind study, comparative research
d. content analysis, census, panel survey
Review Question 5
• Joan systematically observes where people sit on the bus every day for a
month. Based on the patterns she observes, she comes up with a theory of
personal space in public situations. This would be an example of
a. the deductive approach.
b. the inductive approach.
c. feminist sociology.
d. experimental methods.
Sociology on the Street
• There are many ways to research a sociological issue. How might
your choice of research methods, subjects, and even your
perspective alter your results?
• Watch the Sociology on the Street video to find out more:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Credits
• This concludes the Lecture PowerPoint presentation for Chapter 2 of You May Ask Yourself, 7e Full Edition.
• For more resources, please visit digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
CHAPTER 3
Culture and Media
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
Paradox
•
Do mass media create social norms or
merely reflect them? Culture is like two
mirrors facing each other: it simultaneously
reflects and creates the world we live in.
•
Click here to watch the paradox animation:
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3.1 Definitions of Culture
Culture = Human – Nature
•
Culture: The sum of the social categories and concepts we embrace in
addition to beliefs, behaviors (except institutional ones), and practices;
everything but the natural environment around us.
•
The term culture has also been used to refer to the distinction between
what is natural and what is modified or created by humans (culture).
•
Culture is always a relative concept; we cannot talk about culture without
reference to the global world.
Culture = (Superior) Man – (Inferior) Man
•
As colonialism led to interaction with non-Western
peoples, Europeans realized that alternative ways
of living existed and questioned the culture they
had previously taken for granted.
•
Ethnocentrism: The belief that one’s own culture
or group is superior to others and the tendency to
view all other cultures from the perspective of
one’s own.
3.2 Material versus Nonmaterial
Culture
Material versus Nonmaterial Culture
• Nonmaterial culture: Values, beliefs, behaviors, and social norms.
• Material culture: Everything that is a part of our constructed,
physical environment, including technology.
• Nonmaterial culture and material culture have a bidirectional
relationship; they both affect each other.
• Cultural lag: The time gap between the appearance of a new
technology and the words and practices that give it meaning.
Culture Shock and Code Switching
• Culture is what feels normal to us but is actually socially produced;
it is what we do not notice at home but would spot in a foreign
context.
• Culture shock: Doubt, confusion, or anxiety arising from immersion
in an unfamiliar culture.
• Code switch: To flip fluidly between two or more languages and sets
of cultural norms to fit different cultural contexts.
Language, Meaning, and Concepts
• Language is an important part of culture.
• According to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in linguistics, the language
we speak directly influences (and reflects) the way we think about
and experience the world.
• Concepts such as race, gender, class, and inequality are part of our
culture as well. In some cases, when opposing concepts come into
contact, one will necessarily supplant the other.
Ideology
•
Ideology: A system of concepts and relationships; an understanding of
cause and effect
•
Ideology is embedded within an entire series of suppositions, and if you
cast aside some of them, they will no longer hold together as a whole.
•
Ideologies can shatter. The fall of the former Soviet Union, for example,
marked not just a transition in government but also the shattering of a
particular brand of Communist ideology.
Studying Culture
•
Cultural relativism: Taking into account the differences
across cultures without passing judgment or assigning
value.
•
Interpreting cultural relativism can be difficult when
local traditions conflict with universally recognized
human rights.
•
Cultural scripts: Modes of behavior and understanding
that are not universal or natural.
•
Margaret Mead introduced the idea that cultural
scripts shape our notions of gender.
Subculture
•
Subculture: The distinct cultural values and behavioral
patterns of a particular group in society.
•
Historically, a subculture has been defined as a group
united by sets of concepts, values, symbols, and
shared meaning specific to the members of that group
and distinctive enough to distinguish it from others
within the same culture or society.
Culture Effects: Give and Take
•
Values: Moral beliefs.
•
Culture affects us by shaping our values; an example of this process is
how America’s individualistic culture encourages a belief in equal
opportunity that is more fiction that reality.
•
Norms: How values tell us to behave.
•
Socialization: The process by which individuals internalize the values,
beliefs, and norms of a given society and learn to function as members of
that society.
Reflection Theory
• Reflection theory: The idea that culture is a projection of social
structures and relationships into the public sphere, which serves as
a screen onto which the film of the underlying reality of social
structures of a society is projected.
• A Marxist version of reflection theory argues that cultural objects
reflect the material labor and production relationships that went
into making them.
Examples of magazines covering Immigration
• Taken from book by Leo Chavez
• COVERING IMMIGRATION:
• POPULAR IMAGES AND THE POLITICS OF THE NATION
3.3 Is the Media “hegemonic”?
Hegemony
•
Hegemony: A condition by which a dominant group uses its power to
elicit the voluntary “consent” of the masses.
•
Hegemony stands in contrast to domination, or getting people to do what
you want through the use of force.
•
The concept of hegemony is important for understanding the impact of
the media. Are people molded by the culture in which they live or do
they actively participate in shaping the world around them?
3.5 Media Effects
Four Categories of Media Effects
•
Media effects can be placed into four
categories according to their duration and
intention:
•
Short-term and deliberate: advertising
•
Long-term and deliberate: a campaign
•
Short-term and unintentional: violence in the
media encourages violent behavior
•
Long-term and unintentional: prejudices,
stereotypes, desensitization to violence
3.6 Mommy, Where Do
Stereotypes Come From?
Racism in the Media
•
The media can create, reinforce, and
perpetuate racist ideologies and stereotypes
based on ethnicity, gender, religion, and
other factors.
•
These acts of racism and stereotyping can
be intentional or unintentional, and they
can manifest subtly or overtly.
Racism in the Coverage of Hurricane Katrina
•
An example of this was the difference in
wording used to describe survivors of
Hurricane Katrina.
•
A Black survivor was described as “looting
a grocery store” while a pair of White
survivors were described as “finding
bread and soda at a store.”
Sexism in the Media
•
Two frequent critiques of the media
centers on the representation of women:
•
Glamorizing and perpetuating unrealistic
ideals of feminine beauty
•
•
Publishing images of violence against women
Some advertisers are responding to these
criticisms with new approaches.
3.7 Political Economy of the
Media
Consumer Culture
• Consumerism: The steady acquisition of material possessions, often
with the belief that happiness and fulfillment can thus be achieved.
• America is often described as a consumer culture.
•
This is reflected in sales that thrive on major holidays.
•
Through the vending of brands, goods, and possessions, we are being
sold a self-image, a lifestyle, and a sense of belonging and self-worth.
Advertising and Children
•
Advertising is an increasing presence
in middle and high schools.
•
The result of such advertising is the
creation of a self-sustaining consumer
culture among children.
•
This culture is different for low-income
and high-income families.
Allison Pugh Interview
•
Allison Pugh describes how
“corporate marketing to children is a 2
2 billion dollar industry.”
•
Click here to watch the interview:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Culture Jams
•
Culture jamming: The act of turning media
against themselves
•
This is part of a larger movement against
consumer culture and consumerism, based
on the notion that advertisements are a
form of propaganda.
•
The satirical Joe Chemo ad is one example.
Review & Discuss
Review Question 1
• Which of the following is an example of material culture?
a. Buddhist temple
b. music website
c. English garden
d. all of the above
Review Question 2
• Ideology can be described as
a. an aspect of material culture.
b. a system of concepts and relationships that guides an individual or
large group.
c. an extreme point of view on a given topic.
d. none of the above
Review Question 3
• Cultural scripts are
a. modes of behavior and understanding that are not universal or natural.
b. a type of role playing that helps people learn about different cultures.
c. a type of study developed by sociologists to catalog cultural differences.
d. patterns of behavior that can be found in almost all cultures.
Review Question 4
• Examples of media include
a. television, websites, and radio.
b. books, magazines, and ancient scrolls.
c. records, cave paintings, and streaming video.
d. all of the above
Review Question 5
• True or false? The globalization of the media has spread American
culture around the world.
a. true
b. false
Discussion Questions
• In your opinion, does the media impact culture? If so, how?
• Does the media create culture, simply reflect culture, or both?
Sociology on the Street
• How can we make assumptions about people before we even meet
them?
• What assumptions do you make if you know a person’s name?
• Watch the Sociology on the Street video to find out more:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Credits
• This concludes the Lecture PowerPoint presentation for Chapter 3 of You May Ask Yourself, 7e Full Edition.
• For more resources, please visit digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7.
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
CHAPTER 4
Socialization and the
Construction of Reality
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company
Paradox
• The most important aspects of social
life are those concepts we learn
without anyone teaching us.
• Click here to watch the paradox
animation:
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4.1 Socialization: The Concept
What is Socialization?
•
Socialization is the process by which individuals
internalize the values, beliefs, and norms of a
given society and learn to function as a member
of that society.
•
One example of socialization is the way young
children are taught in school to raise their hand
when they want to speak.
4.2 Limits of Socialization
Limits of Socialization
• Socialization cannot explain everything about a person’s
development and personality.
• Biology is also a very important component of who a person is.
• It is the combination of biology and social interactions that makes us
who we are.
4.3 Theories of Socialization
Charles Horton Cooley
• Cooley theorized that the “self”
emerges from our ability to assume
the point of view of others and
imagine how those others see us.
George Herbert Mead (1 of 2)
•
Mead developed a theory about how the social self develops over the
course of childhood.
•
Infants know only the I, but through social interaction they learn about
me and the other.
•
Children develop a concept of the generalized other, which allows
them to apply norms and behaviors learned in specific situations to
new situations.
George Herbert Mead (2 of 2)
•
Mead stressed the importance of
imitation, play, and games in
helping children recognize one
another, distinguish between self
and other, and grasp the idea that
other people can have multiple
roles.
Discussion Questions
• Think of a sport or a game you played as a child that involved
taking on roles.
• What were the roles involved in the game?
• Did playing roles help you better understand the self and the
other?
• If it did, how so? If it didn’t, why not?
4.4 Agents of Socialization
Families
•
For most individuals, the family is the original source and the primary
unit of socialization.
•
Socialization is a two-way street: Information doesn’t always flow from
the older to the younger family members.
•
For example, the children of immigrants are likely to socialize their parents into
the dominant culture of their current country.
•
Socialization in the family can be affected by various demographics.
Social Class and Family Socialization
• Parents of different social classes socialize their children differently.
• Middle-class parents are more likely to value independence and
self-direction in their children, whereas working-class parents
prioritize obedience to external authority for their children.
• Sociologist Annette Lareau conducted an ethnography to study how
parents transmit these values to their children.
Annette Lareau’s Findings
•
Lareau found that middle-class parents are more likely to engage in
“concerted cultivation.”
•
They structure their children’s leisure time with formal activities and reason with
them over decisions in an effort to foster their kids’ talents.
•
Working-class and poor parents are more likely to engage in the
“accomplishment of natural growth.”
•
They give their children the room and resources to develop but leave it up to the
kids to decide how they want to structure their free time.
Interview: Annette Lareau
•
Lareau explains that parenting
strategies vary by social class, and
points out that it is unclear whether
these differences affect the long-
term outcomes of children.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7
Discussion Questions
•
You have just learned about Annette Lareau’s classification of parenting
styles.
•
What might a weekend look like for a family with parents who follow the
“accomplishment of natural growth” approach with their children?
•
What might a weekend look like for a family with parents who follow the
“concerted cultivation” approach with their children?
School
•
For children entering school, the primary locus of socialization shifts to
include reference groups such as peers and teachers.
•
Schools teach us basic behavioral norms, and when students resist those
norms, many parents and teachers turn to medication.
•
Schools also perpetuate social class advantages through socialization.
•
Private prep schools indoctrinate the students who attend them into a world of
social status and privilege.
Interview: Fadi Haddad
•
Haddad treats children who have
been referred to him because their
parents or teachers think they have
attention-deficit hyperactivity
disorder (ADHD).
•
Click here to watch the interview:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7
Peers
•
Peers are particularly strong agents of socialization in adolescence,
because adolescents spend a great deal of their free time in the
company of their peers.
•
Peer groups usually expect some sort of conformity from their
members—a phenomenon called peer pressure—and these
expectations can either reinforce of contradict messages taught at
home.
Adult Socialization
• Adult socialization refers to socialization that occurs in adulthood
as we take on new roles and jobs.
• Resocialization is the process by which one’s sense of social
values, beliefs, and norms are reengineered, often deliberately,
through an intense social process.
Erik Erikson
•
Erikson established a theory of human development that identifies
eight stages that span a person’s lifetime.
•
He believed each stage involves a specific conflict that the person must
resolve in order to move on to the next stage.
•
If we do not successfully navigate the tension inherent to a particular
stage of development, we are headed for problems later on thanks to
our “unresolved issues.”
Erik Erikson’s Social-Psychological Stages
Stage
Age
Key Relationship(s)
Characterized by
Virtue Earned
1
Infant
Mother
Learning how much to trust people.
Hope
2
2-4
Parents
Learning autonomy.
Will
3
5-8
Family
Initiative vs. guilt.
Purpose
4
9-12
School
Where do I fit in the world?
Competence
5
13-19
Peers
Who am I?
Fidelity
6
20s-40s Friends, Spouses
Struggle to make connections with others.
Love
7
40s-50s Child-raising, Career
Generativity: the struggle to avoid stagnation.
Care
8
60+
Integrity: feeling pride or despair about one’s
life accomplishments.
Wisdom
Life Accomplishments
Discussion Questions
• Answer the following questions about your assigned stage of development.
•
What tension must be resolved at this stage? What are some examples of
how a child or adult might learn to resolve this tension?
•
What virtue does the person emerge with if this tension is resolved? Do
you agree that this virtue correlates with this tension? Why or why not?
•
Do you agree with Erikson’s stages of development? Why or why not?
•
Are there any changes you would make to Erikson’s system?
Total Institution
•
A total institution is an institution in
which one is totally immersed and
that controls all the basics of day- today life; no barriers exist between
the usual sphere of daily life, and all
activity occurs in the same place and
under the same single authority.
4.5 Social Interaction
Merton’s Role Theory: Status and Roles
• A status is a position in society that comes with a set of
expectations.
• Roles are the behaviors expected from a particular status.
• Role conflict occurs when the roles associated with one status
clash with the roles associated with a different status.
• Role strain occurs when roles associated with a single status clash.
Discussion Questions
• Have you ever experienced role conflict or role strain?
• Describe the role(s) involved and how it felt.
Merton’s Role Theory: Types of Statuses
•
There are several types of statuses.
•
A status set refers to all the statuses one holds simultaneously.
•
An ascribed status is one we are born with that is unlikely to change.
•
An achieved status is one we have earned through individual effort or
that is imposed by others.
•
A person’s master status is a status that seems to override all others
and affects all other statuses that he or she possesses.
Gender Roles
• Gender roles sets of behavioral
norms assumed to accompany one’s
status as masculine, feminine, or
other.
• Gender theorists argue that gender
roles can be more powerful and
influential than other roles that
Discussion Questions
• How would your life differ if you were born a different sex?
• What parts of your life would remain the same?
Interview: C. J. Pascoe
•
Pascoe talks about the use of the
term “fag” by high school boys. She
argues that the term is used to police
the boundaries of masculinity and is
not primarily about sexuality.
•
Click here to watch the interview:
digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7
4.6 The Social Construction of
Reality
The Social Construction of Reality
• Social construction refers to how people give meaning or value to
ideas or objects through social interactions.
• The social construction of reality is an ongoing process that is
embedded in our everyday interactions.
Symbolic Interactionism
•
Symbolic interactionism is a micro-level theory in which shared meanings,
orientations, and assumptions form the basic motivations behind people’s actions.
•
This theory suggests that the social construction of meaning is a process:
1. We act toward ideas, concepts, and values on the basis of the meaning that
those things have for us.
2. These meanings are the products of social interaction.
3. These meanings are modified and filtered through an interpretive process.
Dramaturgical Theory
• Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical theory is the view of social life as
essentially a theatrical performance, in which we are all actors on
metaphorical stages, with roles, scripts, costumes, and sets.
• Each actor’s goal is to make a positive impression on others. How
we do this will differ based on the setting.
• Face: The esteem in which an individual is held by others.
Ethnomethodology
•
Ethnomethodology means the “methods of the people” and is an approach to
studying human interaction that focuses on the ways in which we make sense of our
world, convey this understanding to others, and produce a mutually shared social
order.
•
Harold Garfinkel developed a method for studying social interactions, called “breaching
experiments,” which involved having collaborators exhibit abnormal or atypical
behaviors in social interactions in order to see how people would react.
Discussion Questions
• Propose an idea for your own breaching experiment.
• What would you do?
• How would you expect people to react?
The Internet and Interaction
• The Internet has created new types of social interaction that
don’t incorporate the verbal and visual cues people are
accustomed to relying on.
• It has also changed society by creating new types of crimes
and new methods of communication.
Maintaining the Social Construction of Reality
• Because our reality is socially constructed, an unexpected change
in that reality can be upsetting, frustrating, or just plain
incomprehensible.
• We all have a stake in maintaining consensus on shared meanings
so that our society can continue to function smoothly.
Review & Discuss
Review Question 1
• In social development theory, the “self” can be defined as
a. the individual identity of a person as perceived by that same
person.
b. the person’s sense of agency, action, or power.
c. the identity of a person as perceived by others.
d. all of the above
Review Question 2
• According to George Herbert Mead’s stages of development,
children learn to recognize an “other” through
a. formal games.
b. imitation.
c. playing informally with other children.
d. none of the above
Review Question 3
• Which of the following is an example of a total institution?
a. an elementary school
b. a sports team
c. a convent
d. a political party
Review Question 4
• Which of the following theories argues that people’s choices about how
to act are based on shared meanings, orientations, and assumptions?
a. symbolic interactionism
b. functionalism
c. dramaturgical theory
d. postmodernism
Review Question 5
• Harold Garfinkel is well known for
a. developing the theory of impression management.
b. creating breaching experiments.
c. investigating the armed forces as a total institution.
d. his analysis of socialization agents.
Discussion Questions
• Who and what socialized you, and how was it done?
• In what ways are you a socializing agent?
Sociology on the Street
• Why does breaking social norms make others
uncomfortable or even hostile?
• Watch the Sociology on the Street video to find out
more: digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7
Credits
• This concludes the Lecture PowerPoint presentation for Chapter 4 of You May Ask Yourself, 7e.
• For more resources, please visit: digital.wwnorton.com/youmayask7
Copyright © 2021 W. W. Norton & Company