Davis and Moore, and Agger notes PDF

Preview

Summary

readings...

Description

Davis and Moore, Agger Thursday, April 22, 2021

10:01 AM

Davis and Moore Principles of Stratification •

The system of positions, not to the individuals occupying the positions

Functional Necessity of Stratification • Stratification is the requirement faced by any society of placing and motivating individuals in the social structure. • Society must distribute its members in social positions and induce them to perform the duties of these positions. • Some positions require special training • Society must have rewards and a way of distributing the rewards ○ Three types of rewards: § Contribute to sustenance and comfort § Contribute to humor and diversion § Opinion of others • The rewards are built into the position • Social inequality- unconsciously evolved device by which societies insure that the most important positions are filled by the most qualified people. Two Determinants of positional rank: • Have the greatest importance for society ○ Concerns function and is a matter of relative significance • Require the greatest training or talent ○ Concerns means and is a matter of scarcity • Two ways a persons qualifications come about: training and inherent capacity Major societal functions and stratification: • Religion ○ Human society achieves its unity primarily through the possession by its members of certain ultimate values and

○ ○ ○

possession by its members of certain ultimate values and ends in common. Influence behavior, and their integration enables the society to operate as a system. Person who can communicate with supernatural is powerful individual- highest position of power Through belief and ritual the common ends and values are connected with an imaginary world symbolized by concrete objects.

Agger Critical Social Theories •

CST opposes positivism ○ Knowledge is an active construction by scientists, NOT a reflection of inert world ○ Opposes that science should describe natural laws of society-- instead believes society is characterized by historicity (susceptible to change) ○ CST distinguishes between past and present § The potential for a better future is already contained in the past and present. § Endorses the possibility of progress § Future society through political and social action § Role of CST is to raise consciousness about present oppression and demonstrate the possibility of a qualitatively different future society. § Bring about social change § Steps back from society in order to appraise it and offer insight to groups ○ Domination is structural § Peoples everyday lives are affected by larger social institutions such as politics, economics, culture, gender etc. § Helps people understand the roots of their oppression ○ Structures of domination are reproduced through peoples false consciousness, promoted by ideology § CST argues that social change begins at home in

○ ○

•

everyday lives § CST avoids determinism and endorses voluntarism CST conceptualizes the bridge between structure and agency as dialectical (by rejecting economic determinism) CST opposes that progress lies at the end of a road of sacrificing peoples liberties and lives. § CST holds people responsible for their own liberation

Positivists tendencies in social sciences provoked CST, beginning with Marx

Marx: • Historicity- refers to the historical fluidity of social patterns • Historicity of society suggests that past and present patterns can be changed through concerted political and social efforts by oppressed people.

• •

• •

CST is grounded in postpositivist notions of science CST portray history as a horizon of possibilities constrained but not determined by the past and present. ○ Emancipation is predicted on peoples ability to recognize "historicity" French existentialists- Beauvoir Ideology refers to any organized belief system that represents social change as impossible ○ Subtle attempts to portray the present as both rational and necessary...