Sociology midterm answers PDF

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Midterm Long form questions 1. What is the relationship between GENDER and BIOLOGICAL SEX? According to sociologists how do bodies and gender interact? Describe using examples drawn from the text or lectures Gender is the social distinction between masculinity and femininity while biological sex is a determination of male and female on the basis of a set of socially agreed upon biological criteria. Sex and gender are both usually seen as a binary although they might not always line up to what is socially acceptable. According to sociologists sex and gender are 2 different things both of which are not so obviously a binary as was once thought of as. Many activities that are socially constructed to be “male” or “female” in nature are really just “people” activities in nature. An example of someone who skews the line or what it means to male or female is Caster Semenya, a runner from South Africa. After Caster performed exceptionally well at running competition her gender was put under scrutiny. Caster was revealed to be intersex and although she has female genitals she did not have ovaries and had undescended testes resulting in an increased of testosterone in her system. Although she identified her gender as girl all her life and outwardly physically was female (although facial features/body type were seen as butch) her sex did not fit on the binary. Also there is limited evidence that testosterone alone actually increased athletic performance in women. 2. What are IN-GROUP and OUT-GROUP biases? Using a strong example describe how these concepts help sociologists to understand racial discrimination. Your answer should include a working definition of race. In-group biases are the belief that every member of one’s own group is unique and responsible for no one’s actions but their own. Out-group biases are the perception that all members of an out-group share traits and responsibility for the action of each other. Race is thought of as a group that is physically and genetically thought of as distinguished from other groups. The concepts of in-group and out-group biases help sociologists understand racial discrimination because often the majority or the dominant population uses their status as a way to disadvantage the minority population as they are seen as the out-group and therefore the people in the majority or the in-group don’t see them as they same as their own group. When Europeans came to Canada they viewed the Indigenous Peoples as naturally inferior to them, therefore the Europeans felt as though their treatment of indigenous people was justified.

3. Using examples drawn from the text and lectures, describe the social and historical developments that led to the creation of the NUCLEAR FAMILY. Why might sociologists refer to the 1950s as the ‘weird 1950s?’ The Nuclear family was seen as monogamous marriage with offspring. Mon and Dad having very specific social and gender roles. Mothers were expected to stay at home with the children and do any sort of domestic labour, while the Father was expected to go out into public life and provide for the family financially. Sociologist may refer to the 1950s as the “weird 1950s”

because of the intense social engineering of what families ought to look like. In the past the structure of families was not as structured. Early European families were often very communal and multi-generational, everyone worked together, and including the children, to provide and these communities were often very isolated. During the industrial revolution families moved into cities but all the members were still expected to work and help provide for the family. During the ‘weird 1950s’ men were given “breadwinner” salaries that weren’t meant to be able to support the entire family so that the women were able to stay home and do the domestic labour. This was less natural and more an example of social engineering for ideological reasons. 4. Using examples from the textbook and lectures, describe how CULTURAL THEORISTS understand education. How does this theory compare with the ways that POST-STRUCTURALISTS THEORISTS view education? Cultural theorists believe that education is not value neutral and it rewards compliance with dominant power structures. Uses education as a means of reproducing social values and norms and value and devaluing things within our culture. This limits how we are able to think as it encourages people to have the same thought patterns. An example of cultural theory in action is the public system education in American vilifying communism and socialism during the cold war. Post-structuralists also recognized education being seeped in power but in a different way. Power is implicated in knowledge as it is the driving force for what is learned, how it is learned and who teaches it. A strong example of this would be how the focus of environmentalism has been shifted away from corporations and toward individuals as the driving force of pollution. Both cultural and post-structuralist stem from power structures trying to produce individuals who follow and abided by what they want them to in order to continue to be powerful and controlling.

5. According to sociologists, is Canada becoming more SECULAR? Support you answer by drawing on materials from the text or lectures. Provide a single, strong example if necessary. To process of becoming more secular is called secularization, where societies move away from explanations based on religion to ones based on science and logic. Although Canada may be becoming more Terms and Definitions Secularization Secularization is the process by which developed societies move away from explanations based on religions to ones based on science, rationality, and logic. As societies industrialized, rational and scientific explanations gained more influence rather than religious explanations. Secularization often occurs concurrently with institutions becoming controlled by the state instead of religious groups. In Canada Schools were once run only by the church, nuns were often the teachers, now public schools are not affiliated with religion.

Intersectionality Intersectionality is the simultaneous influence of multiple relations, including race, gender, ethnicity and class. The context of a given scenario determines which elements of the people involved are privileged or subordinated. All women are not equally and similarly disadvantaged. Racialized women are subordinated due to their position in relation to white women; in their own minority group communities, they are subordinated due to their position in relation to men. Gender intensification Gender intensification is the increased pressure girls and boys experience to conform culturally to gender roles. Often even more increased during puberty. While education is largely standardized and gender- neutral by early adolescence girls and boys are often streamlined into different fields of study. In the past boys were moved into physical sciences and vocational training while girls were streamed into literature and “domestic studies.” Domestic Labour Unpaid work performed within the home. Domestic labour is primarily performed by women while men remain the primary decision makers. This work includes child rearing, cleaning and cooking. Even when women tend to work more they often still continue to do most of the housework or domestic labour Agency and Structure Agency is the assumption that individuals have the ability to alter their socially constructed life. An example of agency are the individual students within an education system who believe that if they work hard enough they will someday be able to have a good paying job. Structure is the network of relatively stable opportunities and constraints influencing individual decisions and behavior. An example of structure would be the actual education system that may prevent someone from gaining a good education due to say their lack of funding. Modernity The product of the three sociological revolutions, which created socio/cultural norms, attitudes and practices of today. Questioning of tradition, social and scientific progress and urbanization. There are many examples of modernity in everyday life such as the increase of access individuals have to information and technology. This access has sparked the ability of people to learn about events happening within their community and across the world, people today have a wider worldview now more than ever. Sociological Imagination C.W Mills (an American sociologist) term for the ability to perceive how dynamic social forces influences individual lives. The context of a given phenomenon or scenario determines which elements of the people involved are privileged or subordinated. If you can apply the sociological imagination to many different behaviors, an example could be someone who drinks tea. This person may drink tea as a means to maintain good health, it could also be considered a ritual for people who drink tea a certain way or at a certain time, tea drinking could also be considered as an addiction to caffeine and tea drinking could also be seen as a social activity as meeting for tea focuses less on the beverage and more on talking with others.

The ‘three revolutions’ The scientific revolution was the first revolution during the 18 th and 19th centuries in Europe where people began understanding the world in more rational and empirical ways, instead of assuming that things like crops dying was because God was angry at them they thought could come to the conclusion that they died because they didn’t water them enough. The second revolution was the political revolution which changed how people governed including the implementation of democracy, this gave way to the concept of private property and the belief that one has the right to work on the land they work on. The third revolution was the Industrial revolution that combined both scientific and political revolutions with new technology and using the concept of private property. This brought about capitalism and things like mass production, assembly lines and mass urbanization. Differential Socialization Any person’s upbringing, education, class or opportunities are influenced by social forces that generates privileges or disadvantages based on both ascribed and achieved status. Social inequality is directly linked to differential socialization. I can draw from my own life as an example, growing up in Edmonton I lived on the northside which is often viewed as the bad part of town, I had friends who lived there, went to school there. My socialization experience was different that someone who grew up on the southside which was thought of as more affluent and because of that I have less advantages than someone who grew up on a nicer side of town, something that I became more aware of as I have gotten older. Hyper-Masculinity When our ideas about what makes a ‘real man’ leads to men to engage in destructive and harmful patterns of behavior. This behaviors often have an impact on both himself and the people around him. An example of a hyper-masculinity would be a man who starts injecting steroids and becomes obsessed with going at the gym. He becomes consumed with the idea of looking a certain masculine way and neglects his health and often his relationship with friends and family. Feminine Apologetic The feminine apologetic is an attempt to balance one’s gender performance with the one they are expected to engage in. When a women performs in a traditionally masculine way, she may feel pressure to reassure people that she is authentically a woman. An example of this is the way in which women body builders are supposed to look on competition day. She must wear make-up, have her hair done nice, and a small bikini all to prove that is she is still feminine despite being muscular. Glass Escalator Promotion of men over women into management positions in female-dominated fields such as nursing and education. Parallel to the idea of the glass ceiling where in which women face troubles advancing in the work place. An example of this would be the hospital that I worked in in Edmonton in the diagnostic imaging department. Despite their being an overwhelming number of women working as technologists, majority of the managers were men. Exclusive definition of Religion

Racism An ideology that maintains that maintains that one ‘race’ is inherently superior to another. Racism is backed by power that denies access to social, goods, services and power to minority populations justified through appeals to stereotypes and prejudice. An example of racism is the travel ban implemented by President Donald Trump. Although this ban is not blatantly racists, the ban is only on majority Muslim countries. Instrumental roles Instrumental roles was a part of the functionalism theory of families. Men were responsible for engaging in paid labour outside the home as opposed to the women who took on the expressive role responsible for the emotional well-being of the family members and the socialization of the children. An example of this is in the show Mad Men, every day Don Draper went into to the big city to work at an ad agency while his wife betty draper stayed at home in the suburbs raising the two kids and the dog. Correspondence Principal Principle whereby the structures of workplaces are reflected in the structures of schools. We see this through grades and wages both as motivating factors for students and workers. There are similar authority structures with managers corresponding with teachers and workers corresponding to teachers. Schools in a capitalistic society are structured in such a way as to prevent social class mobility, class inequality is inevitable, and a look at tuition rates supports this view. Mcdonaldization of education Notion that institutions are expected to function in ever more efficient ways, with a high degree of predictability and standardization. We see this in Universities, students are the customers who consume education as a commodity. Universities must compete for and retain students. Increased class sizes, few faculty members, less direct government funding and increased tuition costs combine to diminish the possibilities of Canadian institutions offering high-quality, accessible education. Ascribed Status Attributes, both advantages and disadvantage, assigned at birth. These attributes are completely out of one’s control. Being born into a wealthy family has nothing to day with an infant’s individual qualities and being born riche usually means a person will have more opportunities in the future. Sociology teaches us that the majority of people who are born poor will remain poor. Allocation A part of functionalism theory of education that refers to the assigning of grades and handing out of degrees as a sorting mechanism for future roles in society. Education credentials matter as an indication of where people find themselves in the social hierarchy. Someone who has only gained their high school diploma will likely have less opportunities than someone who has gained a bachelor’s degree. Part of a capitalistic society. Status Anxiety

When a majority group begins to fear displacement or reversal of roles with a minority group who are attempting to improve their social access/standing. Progressive activism aimed at improving social access are perceived as attacks on the dominant group, therefore disrupting that activism becomes priority. An example of this is the reactionary movement to the Black Lives Matter group with All Lives Matters. This movement discredits what the black lives matter movement is attempting to do, which is to stop police brutality on black people specifically as they are the ones at a disadvantage....