Week 1 Sociology Notes

1. The sociological perspective, as a way of thinking about the world, includes the sociological imagination from C. Wright Mills, the beginner’s mind from Bernard McGrane, and the idea of culture shock from anthropology. Explain what all three of these concepts have in common.

Sociologists employ three major theoretical perspectives in sociology today. They are the structural-functionalist perspective, the conflict perspective, and the symbolic interactionism. The structural-functionalist perspective is done at a macro level and its focus is on the relationships between the parts of society. The Conflict perspective is done at a macro level and its main focus is on how the wealthy controls the poor and weak.

C. Wright Mills defined sociological perspective as the ability to “think yourself away from the familiar routines of everyday life” and “the vivid awareness of the relationship between experience and the wider society.”

Sociology is a social science that enables people to understand the structure and dynamics of society. By using a scientific approach, and by critically analysing society using qualitative and quantitative methods, sociologists can find patterns and connections within human behaviour to provide explanations of how society affects people. Sociological views are based on theories that have been tested through unbiased research and attempt to take all values into account. Common sense theories are generally individualistic and naturalistic assumptions that are based on opinions than can vary depending on an individuals

Gender socialization takes place in our everyday lives whether we subconsciously know it or not. Gender socialization is the socially learned expectations and behaviors associated with members of each gender. For example, If I were to say it takes my friend at least 45 minutes to do their hair before school everyday, you would assume I am speaking about a friend who is a female as opposed to a friend who is male. This is because of the idea of gender socialization.

This is called gender socialization, which exaggerates sexual differences physically, experimentally, academically, and psychologically. Most parents are unaware that they play such a large role in creating a male or female child. But they are the first and one of the largest influences on their child. When parents have a female child she is viewed as sweet and gentle. The parents will even hold their daughter closer than they would a son. As they grow older boys are encouraged to explore while girls are kept closer to their parents. They are taught different approaches to many different problems in life. They may not realize it but through their interactions with their children they are encouraging their children to grow into a certain type of person based on their gender. The toys they are introduced to are even gender-based. Toys for males encourage them to develop such abilities of spatial perception, creativity, competition, aggression, and constructiveness. Toys for girls encouraged creativity, nurturance, and attractiveness. Children’s rooms and clothing are specific color: girls are pink and boys are blue. Girls often wear dresses and skirts that limit their physical activity. These types of influences at such an early age lay a foundation for the child’s personality. By the time they reach school age they already have a sense of being male or female. In school peers and teachers enforce these differences even further. (Lips, 1979,

"Gender Socialization is the process through which children learn about the social expectations, attitudes and behaviors typically associated with boys and girls (Hanish & Fabes, 2014)". Children learn from their parents about how the world works. Children first teacher are there mother and father. If they had learned children who play with the opposite sex toy grow up into a gay man or a lesbian female, then they would believe the same acts could happen to them if they were to play with the opposite sex toy. Children not only learn about gender roles from their parents but they also learn from their peer groups. According to Doctor Laura and Richard also stated: In regard to gender development children’s gendered behavior becomes more similar to those they spend time with (Hanish & Fabes, 2014). Children learn either bad habits or good habits from their peer circle, they would change their self’s in order to be well liked by the others in their groups. Our society should not care about socialization and what's an appropriate toy for children to play

There are many social agents that cause the construction of gender roles. Parents and family are important socialization agents in the gender role development of children. They have different values and attitudes regarding male

Social perspective is a view of world in its social environment. For example, social groups and how they influence the behavior of others and the bigger picture of the society that organizes it. This chapter also talks about sociologist and their methods of social perspectives. Sociologists like Comte, Spencer, Marx, and Weber developed ideas of sociology. There were several methods on understanding social perspectives. It included eight steps that involved analyzing, collecting, and further studying all data.

A sociological perspective on human behavior is connected to the society as a whole. It invites us to look for the connections between the behavior of individuals and the structures of the society in which they live. (Appendix 1)

The sociological perspective was defined by Peter Berger as seeing the general in particular. What this means is that by using the sociological perspective, sociologists can observe trends by looking at how individuals within groups act. Sociologists use the sociological perspective to observe how society impacts individuals, whereas psychologists observe individuals and how their own experiences influence their lives and choices. Someone using a political perspective would think about how the political world can influence individuals, and someone with a religious perspective would think about how the presence or lack of religion would affect an individual.

What are the three major sociology perspectives in regards to social issues? They are Symbolic Interactionism perspectives, Functionalism perspectives, and Conflict Theory perspectives. These perspectives offer sociologists abstract examples for explaining how society affects people, and vice versa. Each perspective individually theorizes society, social forces, and human behavior.

The basic insight of the sociological perspective is that the world does not consist of a reality that everyone sees in exactly the same way and that each and every one of us possesses our own individual social construction of reality (the sum total of our life experience, observations and thoughts.) The Micro level of analysis is that which pertains to the individual and the macro level applies to the larger society.

Sociology is a study of society social life, social change, and social causes and consequences of human behaviour and allows us to gain an understanding of the structure and dynamics of today’s society, looking at the interlinking links patterns of human behaviour. Sociology looks at the in which social structure and institutions affect our everyday life. Sociological imagination was founded by C. Wright mills in the 1950`s it is an overall understanding of that some of the things that happen in society may lead to a particular outcome. Mills said

Throughout the semester, we have learned about a variety of things that have changed the way I perceive people and the world around me that I never did before. One thing we learned about is sociological perspective. This is a perspective on humans and society as a whole. It means looking at society and how it is affected by humans, then looking at humans to see how the different changes in society have affected us. Before our Soc 101 class, I thought stuff just happened. The way perceive things and act as humans is because of the way society has socialized us. The three main sociological perspectives are the functionalist perspective, conflict perspective, and symbolic interactionism. The functionalist perspective claims that all parts of society