C. Wright Mills “The Promise” of the Sociological Imagination
“Bounded by private orbits…limited to the close-up scenes of job, family, neighborhood…move vicariously and remain spectators”
“Neither the life of an individual nor the history of society can be understood without understanding both”
“personal troubles of milieu” and “public issues of social structure”
Impersonal changes in the structure of a society, historical transformations, institutional contradictions shape the patterns of our own lives.
The struggle to remain private men and women is a strategy to cope with rapid transformations in our social world.
The Sociological Imagination- quality of mind or form of self consciousness enabling us to understand the broader social and historical scene as it shapes our inner lives, to understand the interplay of history and biography.
What types of individuals prevail in a given historical period?
What is the structure of a society?
Where does that society stand in history?
Journal Topic 2:
Reading: Paula England and Reuben J Thomas “The Decline of the Date and the Rise of the College Hook-up”
England and Thomas “The Decline of the Date and the Rise of the College Hook Up?
Setting: College
Historical context: From courtship to dating to hook-ups.
Shift in behavioral norms: liberalization
Changing meanings about sexual practices? (types of hook-ups)
What is social meaning assigned to the hook-up?
What factors gave rise to the hook-up for England and Thomas?
Postponement of marriage and other adult markers?
Relationship formation and role of dating/ the hook-up as pathway to relationships
Consequences
Changing ideas about intimacy, “Hang out” or “hook up” vs. serious relationships–erosion of the middle ?
Role of technology (Facebook, texting)
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How does gender matter to the hook-up scene?
Sexual scripts and gender system
1. The double standard: One standard for men, another for women?
Women to wed, women to bed
“Preserve the woman attitude or denounce them”
51% women said they felt they were respected less compared to 25% men following hook up
Double standard and gender inequality? Who benefits?
2. Gender differences in relationship orientation/attitudes toward relationships
Changing ideas about casual sex (recreational) vs. relationship sex
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Mills’ “Sociological Imagination”: How to think about hook up as cultural practice using sociological imagination?
Harper and Leicht’s “Trends and Counter trends” If hooking up is a cultural trend, what are its counter trends?
Journal Topic 3:
Reading: Annette Lareau “Invisible Inequality: Social Class and Childrearing in Black Families and White Families”
How are social class inequalities reproduced (passed on) in families?
How to define class? SES: Income, occupation, education (linked to status, prestige and power)
Class categories: Lower income, working class, lower middle class, middle class, Professional-middle class, Upper-middle class
Limits of previous studies? Tend to be descriptive and focused on single dynamic in home (e.g., TV use) 1) Little is known how family life transmits advantage 2) Little is known about how children enact parent’s beliefs
Social advantages and disadvantages transmitted though family life
Role of parenting styles and parenting resources on children’s lives
2 distinct parenting styles/strategies rooted social class: Parenting strategies shape time use, language use and social connection for children.
“Concerted cultivation” a cultural logic of child rearing that is dedicated to cultivating the child through organized activities that create tremendous labor for parents (mothers in particular). Parents’ view toward activities is focused on educational and life skills gained from their participation. Emphasis on cult of individualism and children’s performance (the over-scheduled child)
Focus on language defined by elaborated speech codes and development of reasoning, talking preferred form of discipline
High levels of intervention in activities (helicopter parents)
Result wider range of experiences for the child
“Accomplishment of natural growth”. A logic that child will grow and thrive with love, food and safety. Less focused on cultivating special talents, children participate in few activities, more free time, deeper ties to extended kin.
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Language use: more directives issued by parent to child
Outcomes:
What is impact of these parenting styles on children’s interactions within social institutions?
How do these class-based parenting styles relate to an emerging sense of entitlement for the professional middle class children and emerging sense of constraint for the lower income children?
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Journal topic 4:
Reading: Betsey Lucal “What it Means to Be Gendered Me”
URL Link: http://kincaid-sociology.com/Files/Lucal%20-%20What%20it%20means%20to%20be%20gendered%20me.pdf
What is the consequence of a gender system of “2 and only 2” on social identity and social interaction?
Gender boundaries: Gender as a system of rules and sanctions regarding appropriate and inappropriate gender display
“Doing” gender is about assignment of gender by others—gender that is “given” vs. “given off” (Lucal defines herself as a woman, but is perceived as man). Gender we appear to be (perceived gender)
Gender blending and gender socialization: learning to become women and men means demonstrating alignment of gender and sex (conflate sex and gender).
Misattribution and misidentification of gender “failing to pass” as a woman
Gender non-conformists
Gender as social process involves 1) labeling, 2) gender cues in interaction, 3) interpretations of behavior
-Modes of address are deeply gendered
-Presentation of self in everyday life deeply gendered: appearance mannerisms, action, and demeanor
-Encounters with women in all female settings
-Being perceived as male –access to male-to-male interaction
-When out with a woman, how is Lucal perceived?
Interactional strategies to deal with gender misattribution.
Stigma and passing as a man: safer to be seen as a man than as deviant woman
For Lucal patriarchal constructions of gender create a hierarchy of value masculinity is valued over femininity
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Journal topic 5:
Reading: Eitzen , “The Atrophy of Social Life”
URL Link: http://www.cabrillo.edu/~lroberts/TheAtrophyofSocialLife.pdf
Are we more disengaged from each other? (decline of voluntary associations)
Have our networks grown or shrunk?
Have the types of social relationships and social interactions changed?
Social trends isolate us from each other:
1. Mobile society (making formation of durable more relationships difficult)
2. Living Along is on the rise
3. Modern technology encourages isolation (Computers, A/C, refrigerators)
4. Working remotely (home-based work)
We communicate more, but our interactions are shallow in scope (email, IM, text) Technology increases interaction while reducing intimacy. Person- to- person contact on decline. (The De-Voicing of America)
Creates an illusion of intimacy
5. Geography and Isolation—high levels of segregation—occupational and residential. High levels of age segregation. Together reduce our interactions with others who are unlike us.
Why for Eitzen is interaction with others different from us important?
6. Are families isolated from each other? Busy working parents and overscheduled children.
7. The Architecture of Isolation: how are our home spaces structured to close us off from our neighbors and from other family members?
8. Consumer spaces (rise of mega store) linked to decline in interaction –the rule of efficiency (e.g., self check out)
Give rise to lonely and alienated people? Road rage
What to do? Rethink urban sprawl, reinvest in urban core, engage in public activities
