Sociologi kap1

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• Sociology he systematic or scientific study of human society and social behavior, from large-scale institutions and mass culture to small groups and individual interactions.
• Social science The disciplines that use the scientific method to examine the social world.
• Beginner's mind Approaching the world without preconceptions in order to see things in a new way.
• Culture shock A sense of disorientation that occurs when entering a radically new social or cultural environment.
• Sociological imagination A quality of the mind that allows us to understand the relationship between our individual circumstances and larger social forces.
• Microsociology Small groups or face-to-face, perspective (groups, roles, socialization, interaction, self)
• Marcosociology Large groups, perspective (Society, culture, social institutions, social inequality)
• Theories Abstract presumptions that explain the social world and make predictions about the future. Sometimes we also refer to theories as approaches, schools of thought, paradigms and perspectives.
• Paradigms A set of assumptions
• Positivism The theory that sense perceptions are the only valid source of knowledge.
• Social Darwinism The application of the theory of evolution and the notion of “survival of the fittest” to the study of society. (The idea that certain people become powerful in society because they are innately better).
• Structural functionalism A paradigm based on the assumption that society is a unified whole that functions because of the contributions of its separate structures.
• Solidarity The extent to which individuals feel connected to other members of their group.
• Mechanical solidarity Type of social bonds present in premodern, agrarian societies, in which shared traditions and beliefs created a sense of social cohesion.
• Organic solidarity The type of social bonds present in modern societies, based on difference, interdependence, and individual rights.
• Anomie Used to describe the alienation and loss of purpose that result from weaker social bonds and an increased pace of change.'
• Sacred The holy, divine, or supernatural.
• Profane The ordinary, mundane, or every day.
• Empirical based on scientific experimentation or observation.
• Structure Meets the needs of society by performing functions necessary to maintain social order and stability.
• Dysfunction Disturbance to or undesirable consequences of some aspects of the social system.
• Manifest functions The obvious, intended functions of a social structure of the social system.
• Latent functions The less obvious, perhaps unintended functions of a social structure.
• Conflict theory A paradigm that sees social conflict as the basis of society and social change and that emphasizes a materialist view of society, a critical view of the status quo, and a dynamic model of historical change.
• Means of production Anything that can create wealth: money, property, factories, and other types of businesses, and the infrastructure necessary to run them.
• Proletariat Workers; those who have no means of production of their own and so are reduced to selling their labor power in order to live.
• Bourgeoisie Owners; the class of modern capitalists who own the means of production and employ wage laborers.
• Alienation The sense of dissatisfaction the modern worker feels as a result of producing goods that are owned and controlled by someone else.
• False consciousness A denial of the truth.
• Class consciousness The recognition of social inequality on the part of the oppressed, leading to revolutionary action
• Critical Theory Modern form of marxism. A contemporary form of conflict theory that criticizes many different systems and ideologies of domination and oppression.
• Critical race theory The study of the relationship among race, racism, and power.
• Feminist Theory A theoretical approach that looks at gender inequalities in society and the way that gender structures the social world.
• Queer theory Social theory about gender and sexual identity; emphasizes the importance of differences and rejects ideas of innate identities or restrictive categories.
• Praxis The application of theory to practical action in an effort to improve aspects of society. ( It is the process of deciding what your body has to do then doing it.)
• Rationalization The application of economic logic to human activity: the use of formal rules and regulations in order to maximize efficiency without consideration of subjective or individual concerns.
• Bureaucracies A type of secondary group designed to perform tasks efficiently, characterized by specialization, technical competence, hierarchy, written rules, impersonality, and formal written communication.
• Iron cage Max Weber´s pessimistic description of modern life, in which we are caught in bureaucratic structures that control our lives through rigid rules and rationalization.
• Verstehen Empathic understanding, good social research, which tries to understand the meanings that individuals attach to various aspects of social reality.
• Symbolic interactionism A paradigm that sees interaction and meaning as central to society and assumes that meanings are not inherent but are created through interaction.
• Chicago School A type of sociology practiced at the University of Chicago in the 1920s and 1930s that centered on urban settings and field research methods.
• Pragmatism A perspective that assumes organisms make practical adaptations to their environments; humans do this through cognition, interpretation, and interaction.
• Dramaturgy An approach in which social life is analyzed in terms of its similarities to theatrical performance.
• Ethnomethodology The study of “folk methods” and background knowledge that sustain a shared sense of reality in everyday interactions.
• Conversation analysis A sociological approach that looks at how we create meaning in naturally occurring conversations, often by tapping conversations and examining their transcripts.
• Postmodernism A paradigm that suggests that social reality is diverse, pluralistic, and constantly in flux. (questioning of the ideas and values associated with a form of modernism that believes in progress and innovation)
• Modernism Places trust in the power of science and technology to create progress, solve problems, and improve life.
• Midrange Theory An approach that integrates empiricism and grand theory.
• C.Wright Mills We must look for how larger social forces, such as race, class, gender, politics m.m are involved in creating the context of a person's life. xxx's characterization of sociology as the intersection between biography and history reminds us that the process works in both directions: While larger social forces influence individual lives, individual lives can affect society as well.
• Auguste Comte Positivism, xxx developed a theory of the progress of human thinking from its early theological and metaphysical stages toward a final positive, or scientific, stage.
• Harriet Martineau She was critical of American leadership and culture. She also translated Comte´s “introduction to positive philosophy” into English.
• Herbert Spencer xxx proposed that societies, like biological organisms, evolve through time by adapting to changing conditions, with less successful adaptations falling by the wayside. Social Darwinism.
• Emile Durkheim Structural functionalism. He suggested that people in a simple agricultural society were bound together by mechanical solidarity, that is, on the basis of shared traditions, beliefs, and experiences.
• Robert Merton Delineated the theory of American functionalism even further, identifying manifest and latent functions of different social structures.
• Karl Marx Strong believer in conflict theory, he was also a communist. Developed the theory of Marxism.
• Bella Hooks Feminist theory, consider the intersection of gender and race.
• Max Weber Industrial revolution. The Weberian theory. xxx subsequently expressed a pessimistic view of social forces, such as the work ethic, that shaped modern life.
• George Herbert Mead Was one of the developers of the Chicago School.
• Herbert Blumer xxx gave Mead´s theory the name it now goes by: symbolic interactionism.
• William Edward Burghardt The study of race relations
• Du Bois Groundbreaking research on the history of slave trade, post-civil war reconstruction, the problems of urban ghetto life, and the nature of black American society.
• Jane Addams She believed that women have a special kind of responsibility for solving social problems because they are trained to care for others.
• Erving Goffman He elaborated on Mead’s ideas by using the theatrical metaphor of dramaturgy to describe the ways in which we engage in a strategic presentation of ourselves to others.
• Society a group of people who shape their lives in aggregated and patterned ways that distinguish their group from others.
• Sociological perspective a sociological approach or thinking sociologically.
• Solidarity The degree of integration or unity within a particular society; the extent to which individuals feel connected to other members of their group.
• Social inequality The unequal distribution of wealth, power or prestige among members of a society.
• Eurocentric the tendency to favor European or Western histories, cultures, and values over those of non-Western societies

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