SOCIETY QUESTIONS
Directions: Research the following questions and answer below in your own words.
1. How do sociologists understand status?
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2. How do functionalists view the purpose of a society?
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3. What factors lead one status to become a master status and other to be subordinate?
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4. How can someone experience conflicting demands, leading to role conflict & emotional tensions?
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5. Why were hunting-gathering societies considered the most egalitarian in the world?
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6. Why were pastoral people constantly on the move and fiercely independent?
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7. Why do horticulturalists develop permanent societies and often engage in war?
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8. In what four specific ways do industrial societies differ from preindustrial ones?
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9. What is the functionalist position on human freedom?
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10. According to symbolic interactionists, how do humans exercise freedom?
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Questions on Society
How do subsistence adaptation and technology help in the process of sorting societies?
We can identify six types of societies by focusing on the dominant form of work in a society or subsistence
adaptation. In hunting and gathering societies, people live by hunting wild animals using primitive weapons and
gathering food as it grows naturally. Herding or pastoral, societies often arise in areas with poor soil and rely on
the domestication of animals into herds as a major means of support, linked with either hunting and gathering or
other technology. The semi permanent horticulture produces its food through cultivation of the soil with hand tools
and is more common in areas with fertile soil which is exhausted within three to five years. Agricultural societies
employ animal-drawn plows to cultivate the land and often combine this with irrigation to increase productivity. In
industrial societies the largest portion of the labor force is involved in mechanized production of goods and
services.
What are the elements of social structure?
Social structure is the enduring patterns of social behavior including statuses, roles, norms and institutions that
constitute relatively stable relations in society. A status is a position in a particular social pattern. A role includes
the behavior that goes with but is distinct from the status.
What are two ways in which status is conferred?
Status is either conferred independently of the individual's efforts or abilities (ascribed) or attained through effort
or performance (achieved).
What is a status intervention, and how might it affect a group?
A status intervention is an attempt to diminish the influence of an undesirable status characteristic. Research
shows that groups will discount the input of persons with low status characteristics and be overly positive toward
the input of persons with high status characteristics even if the status has nothing to do with the task of the group
at the time. People of low status can be taught to be assertive in their own realm by learning that people of higher
status do not necessarily know more about everything.
What are postindustrial societies and how are they distinguished from industrial societies?
In a post industrial society, increasingly sophisticated virtually automatic machines take over much unskilled work
and the majority of the labor force becomes employed in service occupations. Government becomes more involved
in realms that were previously dominated by the other institutions of so ciety: family, religion, education and the
economy. This form of society might be thought of as a service society or an information based society.
What are the major differences between modern and pre-modern societies?
According to Durkheim, pre-modern societies are held together by mechanical solidarity or bonds of common
activities and values as opposed to modern societies that are held together by organic solidarity or bonds based on
interdependence.Tonnies used the labels Gemeinschalf or community and Gesellschalf or association to describe
similar differences. Modern societies have more complexity in occupational structure, more formal relationships,
and more reliance on nonfamily institutions and less reliance on custom to regulate behavior.
What is the essential nature of the basic social processes?
Conflict is the process in which the parties struggle against one another for a commonly prized object for example
wars and feuds. Coercion is a process of being forced to act against one's will, as in slavery. Similar to coercion is
exploitation a process in which one is deprived of things that one rightfully is due- for instance when migrant
workers are not paid their full wages due to inability to function well and cheating occurs on the part of the
produce c ompany.Competition involves two or more parties seeking a goal that is not available to them all- for
instance getting a contract to build a bank. Cooperation is a social process in which the parties involved act jointly
to bring about mutual benefit, either as a result of traditional values, direction of an authority figure or a contract.
How do conflict and functionalist theories view social processes?
Structural-functionalists assume that cooperation is part of the nature of society and they look for ways in which
the structure functions to maintain society. Conflict theorists assume that conflict is intrinsic to society and
examine society for signs of conflict, coercion and exploitation.
LEFT PAGE ENTRY: You are to write about one of the many developing countries that are
experiencing radical changes as they attempt to modernize. Middle Eastern nations, India, and
North Africa are predominant examples. Find an account of a recent change in a developing
country. Newsweek and Time are very available sources, as well as the internet. You are to
analyze the change in terms of the country’s movement from a preindustrial society to a more
industrialized society by using the following concepts:
a. Simplicity vs. Complexity (little division of labor vs. elaborate division of labor)
b. Homogeneity vs. Heterogeneity (population is alike vs. population is dissimilar)
c. Intimacy vs. Impersonality (Social life in primary groups vs. secondary groups)
d. Traditionalism vs. Modernism (Past/no social change vs. Future/social change)
** You may answer these four questions in the form of a chart if you desire**