1/23/13 – Lecture 1
I)
II)
What is Sociology?
a. Weird Field, holistic way of thinking of the world that is not natural to Americans
b. Systematic study of social life.
c. Attempt to explain causes of a social phenomenon
i. IE: Recent Election: America=Not focused on policy, platforms, more focused on
are candidates “good people.”
d. America is individualist country: American hero is down and out. By themselves. Social
Outsider, heroes’ are not people part of the system (DJANGO?). Reason why sociology is
hard to understand in American culture.
Emile Durkheim: Suicide (most individualistic thing you can do actually has social causes)
a. Egoistic Suicide=Nothing to live for outside of self,
i. Person has low level of integration into society
ii. No goals outside of self=meaningless
iii. What protects people from this is something outside themselves giving them
structure.
iv. Doing things only for yourself is dangerous according to this theory.
v. Protestants more likely to suicide than Jews and Catholics. Why?
1. Protestantism tells people rely on their own conscious, interpretation of
the Bible. Too much freedom=egoistic suicide. Jews and Catholics have
more religious authorities=more protection from suicide.
2. Protestantism asks people what should I live for? Just me? Nothing
outside myself? Nothing to live for!
vi. Married v. Single people= married people more protected from suicide because
they have a family unit to live for. Example of egoistic suicide for single people.
Even applies to widows are protected, especially if they have children.
b. Anomic Suicide=breakdown of social ties, rules, norms, laws.
i. Anomic suicide exists in periods of rapid social change/transformation. Suicide
happens when rules are suspended
1. In countries with static class system, very low suicide rates.
ii. People are tempted when there are no limits to our expectations.
1. IE: New kids in college, don’t know social, academic norms. It’s a new
society/world/ expectation level. Don’t know because rules are
changed. Propensity of suicide UP.
2. Guy from “Off Future” who killed self
c. Altruistic Suicide
i. This kind of suicide results when such high social integration, individual needs
are less important than their societies needs. This type of suicide occurs when
individuals and the group are too close and intimate. This kind of suicide result
ii. Suicide committed for the benefit of others or for the community: this would
include self-sacrifice for military objectives in wartime. Altruistic suicides reflect
a courageous indifference to the loss of one's life
1. Falling on a grenade for a comrade
2. Killing one’s self in old age so as not to be a burden
3. Kamikaze Pilots
d. Fatalistic Suicide = excessive regulation
i. This type of suicide is due to overregulation in society. Under the
overregulation of a society, when a servant or slave commits suicide, when a
barren woman commits suicide, it is the example of fatalistic suicide
ii. When a person see’s no possible way to improve his/her life
III)
IV)
V)
Durkheim: You don’t live in objective truth, you live in social truth. Live within societies
standards. Social world defines limits and what is “good”
1. IE: Being published in sociological journal is great for professor, but
means nothing in my world.
2. Social rules we live within tell us when we are accomplished, or have
done enough. But when there are no limits, anomic suicide can occur.
a. IE: ANY CELIBRITY WITH SELF DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR
Institutions: a pattern of expected action of individuals or groups enforced by social
sanctions (rewards and punishments)
a. Pattern is reproduced and endures
b. Rules that define pattern
c. Sanctions enforce the pattern
d. Purposes and meanings
e. To be human is to have interaction with institution. That is what it is to be human.
f. Institutions provide us with identify
i. IE: “What do you do?” “I am a…” Identifies what institution you associate
yourself with.
Institutions vs. Organizations.
1/28/13 – Lecture 2 – SOCIAL ORIGINS OF THE INDIVIDUAL – WHAT ARE SOME SHORTHAND YOU MADE
I)
Individuals depend on society
a. For social integration=prevents egoistic suicide, REVIEW: HOW?
b. For social regulations= prevents anomic suicide, REVIES: HOW?
c. Society provides integration and regulation through social solidarity
i. Feeling of connection to, embedded in a group that provides cohesion,
participation, and a sense of meaning.
II)
ii. Social integration=social solidarity=gives us limits, regulations, and something to
live for outside ourselves=prevents suicide in modernity
iii. Durkeheim was worried that social solidarity would be broken down with
modern times. (TWITTER, FACEBOOK, TEXTING)
Where does solidarity come from? Depends on the time period you are looking at
a. Mechanical solidarity (old society) – earliest kind of solidarity- WHY IS IT CALLED
MECHANICAL?
i. Solidarity based off of likeness and similarities & a shared “collective conscious”
1. Collective consciousness=beliefs that we all share in a collective mind
and unifies us. When someone violates collective consciousness of our
society, it breaks our collective conscious.
a. Cannibalism, Murder….OTHERS??
ii. Solidarity happens automatically because we’re so similar
iii. We all live same kind of life, practices, laws, technologies, values, beliefs. Same
ideologies and culture
1. IE: Fraternity, sorority, sports club @ school
iv. When people violate common held communal beliefs, they are thrown out of
society.
1. Society that thrives off of conformity, outside thoughts & ideas were
bad b/c they went against collective conscious
v. Swidler argues we are more conformists now than older times (ANY EXAMPLES
OF OUR CULTURE NOT ACCEPTING OUTSIDE, DIVERSE IDEOLOGIES) Mirror
neurons=biological evidence in brain that mechanical solidarity occurs
vi. Societies with mechanical solidarity can break apart more easily though b/c
everybody has same skillset, so if a subset breaks off, they all have same skills to
survive.
b. Organic Solidarity (modern society) – WHY’S IT CALLED ORGANIC?
i. In today’s diversified society w/ different beliefs & ethics, we have a complex
division of labor=many different moralities and can lead to more challenges to
the collective conscious.
ii. Durkheim worries about this in modern times and we will break up, and that we
need a collective conscious to socialize ppl and anchor us in a social reality.
iii. Solidarity now based on interdependence rather than similarities. Attached now
b/c we need each other for our specialized roles. Value each other b/c we’re
different.
1. Farmers – what would we do without them?
2. marriage and partnerships – partners complement each other strengths
and weaknesses.
a. EXAMPLE of division of labor that draws partners together.
iv. As people become interdependent, we actually get stronger ties b/c we are
reliant on each other. Even though we seem so different, we’re so dependent
III)
IV)
V)
VI)
VII)
on each other’s talents & specialties. WOULD DURKEHIM VIEW OUR CURRENT
SOCIETY THIS WAY?
c. Durkheim writes “suicide” because afraid major features of modern society threaten our
existence and well being (1897, right before 20th century, height of industrial revolution)
i. Perhaps too much egoism? Too much rapid social change?
Durkheim’s “Elementary Forms of Religious Life”
a. Attempt for deeper understanding of social solidarity – COMES FROM RELIGION
b. Argues that religion is elementary form of human solidarity. Religion is the original basis
that brings us together.
i. Examines literature on Australian aborigines
c. Realizes that what makes all religions is the distinction between the “sacred” and the
“profane.” This is an essential feature of all religions.
i. Sacred things are kept sacred because they are severely segregated from things
that are profane.
1. Judaism: many sacred things, most sacred is the Torah. Must be written
perfectly, must be recited perfectly.
2. Catholicism: Communion when the body of Christ is consumed
What makes something “sacred”
a. Examines aborigine totem as sacred item in their culture. Kept sacred b/c any
defamation to the totem results in a severe penalty (stoning)
b. Durkheim says groups make things sacred by separating them from the profane and
surrounding them with awe, fear, and love.
i. AMERICAN FLAG = TOTEM – EXPLAIN
ii. ALPHA PHI ALPHA = TOTEM- EXPLAIN
iii. BIBLE = TOTEM
Dual nature of the self – How do people experience connection to others?
a. Through ritual & “collective effervescence”- shared experience & strong emotions
connected with the special gathering of people.
i. CHURCH EXAMPLE AND DIAGRAM = Totem is Religious figure
ii. SPORTING EVENT= Totem is sporting team, the symbol
b. Shared symbols create society
i. IE: Swidler’s husband and the SF Giants. Why do ppl love the SF Giants so much?
1. Not the city, players, owner, uniforms because these things all change.
Then what is it that keeps people allegiance?
2. The name, the totem, the symbol of the SF Giants. Societies are bound
together by the symbols (totems) that share and regard as sacred.
c. Thus, it is totems and the sacredness of the totem shared that collectively make a
society. Symbols are what tie people together!
Paradox of Modernity: Individual is sacred in modernity, but over individualism undermines
our sacred totems & hurts our collective conscious.
STEVE EXAMPLE & SF GIANTS: Steve shares a collective conscious & a social bond with
society of San Francisco Giants. They share a common totem and when he attends a game,
he feels a deeper connection to the culture b/c of the collective effervescence. But with
complex division of society with modernity, puts him in conflict with other totems &
societies (Dodgers)
2/10/13 – Lecture 3 – Review & Brief intro of “Institutions & Identities”
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I)
II)
III)
Durkheim: we need society for integration & regulation. WHY FOR EACH ONE?
o Family, university, friends, church, clubs, teams, etc.
Worries this will not happen with modernity – writes “Elementary forms of Religious Life”
The Individual & Society
a. Ritual def’n: a context where collective life is most intense, dramatic, scripted, or where
script breaks down &/or drama peaks.
i. Ritual=collective effervescence (church service)
ii. Other examples from contemporary society?
b. Totems: representation of a clan or society.
1. Sacred b.c treated with awe, love, respect, & fear bestowed to them by
humans (we give things sacredness) & segregated from profane
2. Profane doesn’t have to be “bad”, can just be everyday, menial life.
c. “What it means to be in a society is to be amongst a group of people that share
common symbols. These interactions with symbols (totems) are what make us human.
Every society has a community that share common symbols.
d. USE IN A SENTENCE WITH AN EXAMPLE: Society, totems, collective conscious, sacred vs.
profane, collective effervescence, ritual
“Dualism of Human Nature”
a. Durk: Aborigines spend most of time doing mundane things, life is ordinary (profane)
b. Periodically gather for ritualistic celebrations (harvest, new moon, etc)
c. Light fires, dancing, substances, drumming, chanting, very intense
d. At these moments, people become “carried away, beside yourself, out of my mind,
crazy” because of the collective effervescence surrounding this ritual. You feel “larger
than life” & swept up in overwhelming experience that is outside of your power
e. Durk: We have 2 sides; regular everyday self & collectively generated self
i. Dualistic feeling very apparent in environment of collective effervescent\
ii. Graduation, funeral, etc.
iii. Felt among all people in society.
Paradox of Modernity
a. With modernity, collective conscious is “receding”, but shared belief in individual,
individual dignity, rights, etc, is the driving ideology in collective conscious of
modernity.
i. Eye contact, speaking & greeting with a person’s name, foreign policy even
battles for dignity and individual liberty in other nations.
b. Issue is individualism tells you to live for nothing outside yourself.
IV)
V)
VI)
VII)
c. Long Quote:
i. Modernity=individual becomes the object of the common religion
ii. Totem is the individual
iii. “It is indeed from society that it draws all this strength, but it is not to society
that it binds us; it is to ourselves. The thing that draws us together (collective
conscious) draws us apart as well.”
Intuitions & Identities
a. Bellah: “a pattern of expected action of individuals or groups enforced by social
sanctions.
i. IN COLLEGE: Most professors won’t ask you to remember it word for word, but
the main idea and key words.
b. W.R. Scott: Institutions are compromised of regulative, normative, and cultural
cognitive elements that, together with associated activities & resources, provide
meaning & stability
c. EXAMPLES IN SOCIETY??
The Mystery of Institutions
a. Created by human beings, but we look @ it as something outside of us.
i. Marriage: we want to interact with marriage, but we didn’t create marriage.
b. Constrain from the outside & appear permanent (that’s just the way it is!)
i. Gov’t, markets: we feel like they’ve just always been around & can seem
unchangeable.
c. All institutions subject to revision & transformable by humans, but treated as if eternal
& external, a fixed part of society.
i. Constitution
4 Components of Institutions
a. Rules or recipes that define the institution (cognitive)
b. Sanctions – rewards & punishments that enforce rules (regulative)
c. Purposes that justify & guide institutional choices
d. Moral Codes (normative)
MATCH THE INSTITUTION WITH THE DEFINITION & 4 COMPONENTS
a. Marriage & the family
b. Religion
c. Educational institutions
d. Medicine, hospitals, and health care institutions
e. Law & the legal system
f. Police Force
g. Mass Media (television, newspapers, popular media)
h. Industry (corporations, business)
i. Arts & Culture
j. Language
k. Individual Persons who create a heavily followed phenomenon
2/21/13 – Lecture 4 – Why Institutions Matter
I)
Why Americans think they hate institutions
a. Invisible Institutions: We depend on them without knowing it (Malawi makes them
invisible)
i. People say “I hate gov’t” – common view from the political right and left
ii. Because we live within institutions because we live within institutions that work
so smoothly and invisibly, we don’t even notice they are there.
b. Markets (and the laws that regulate them) (example of institution)
i. Labor laws, licensing stores have to have, rules and regulations that keep the
institution running smoothly.
ii. These things are not the way the world actually is, but it’s because we have laws
(an institution) that regulates these.
1. People use to just capture people and make them their slaves – this
didn’t stop because the goodness of human nature. It’s b/c institution of
laws and market regulations, such as legal protection from being
enslaved and obtaining a proper wage.
2. We have luxury of being able to go look for a job and are not forced to
work. Or, if we get a job, we have option to leave the institution.
3. Counter example –undocumented workers do get taken advantage of,
but most of us have freedom to choose now our own job
c. Commodity Market
i. Malawi: Most things not for sale (land). Only way to get land is to marry a
woman whose family has land or through inheritance.
ii. Thus, people marry to eat, because they need land to grow food on they eat.
iii. Sometimes, land disputes in which people can’t keep land. Then, they must find
a chief who is responsible for extra land that was lost in order to get the land. If
you do get land from chief, you must agree to burry your family members in the
village of the chief (you can’t live away from family members remains, thus if
you bury them in King’s village, you must live there.. (EXAMPLE OF HOW IN
OTHER COUNTRY, YOU NEED A “HOOK UP”)
iv. Contemporary Example: Many people from European countries are driven crazy
b/c Americans are very friendly. Then, after initial meeting, Americans do not
become actual “friends”. We can be friendly, but cannot be a true “friend”
1. Why? European context of friendship is they get together once a week
for dinner, go on vacations, go to movies, they socialize together. IE:
every Saturday night, they go “folk dancing”
2. When he moved to America, he started folk dancing troupe. Asked new
members to on vacation with him. They said “NO!” We like to folk
dance with you, not vacationing with you. We don’t want to be in a
community with you.
II)
v. This difference is because markets don’t work very well in most countries. If you
need a doctor, or apartment, you need to know somebody. You must have
“friends with influence” or social connections to acquire things. We don’t
necessarily need this in the US, you don’t have to have the “hook up” to get
things, like an apartment, property, or access to things.
1. Example of professor: Her families don’t believe in paying full price for
things – believe you should know somebody who can help you out.
vi. In US, markets work so well, that we really don’t need anybody to give us “the
hook up”. Our market works so well, we can FIRST get a job, but you can sign up
for an apartment, or go to the café and get coffee.
vii. Thus, we are reliant on a complex institution with laws and morals.
1. Uses example of the café with sticky buns. Our market institution is not
about friendship, but about buying and selling with roles (customer and
merchant & they must sell you a product)
2. Legal regulations about the market. If they don’t sell us sticky buns, we
can sue them for discrimination or something else. That merchant is
obligated to sell you the merchandise because of their institutional
roles.
3. Everything is so easily available in our market, so it works so well, we
think we don’t need it.
4. MARKET is the “prime invisible” institution. It’s invisible because it
works so well, it allows us to believe we don’t need any connections. It
makes us feel free. Regulated by ethics and complex laws that work so
smoothly, we don’t even recognize we need it.
a. Both the labor market and the economic market.
d. Basic security and enforceable legal rights (Components within our institution that
makes it run so smoothly)
i. Many places in the world where if local chief or officer likes your house, or your
wife, or daughter, he can just take them and you will have no recourse. Stuff is
yours only as long as people commonly all agree it’s yours or person who is in
authority agrees to protect it for you.
ii. SHE IS SO LIBERAL – PEOPLE WHO DON’T WANT GOV’T INTERFERENCE ARE
SHOWING EXACTLY WHAT SHE SAYS, WE THINK WE DON’T GOV’T BECAUSE OR
GOV’T IS RUNS SO SMOOTH, WE DON’T EVEN NOTICE HOW IT ALLOWS US TO
GET AHEAD.
e. Things we take for granted as being ours and can’t be taken away (family, kids,
apartment, spouse, inheritance, food, etc.) are part of the institution that we actually do
rely on, but may not see.
Roles and Rules: How institutions ground moralities.
a. Institutions define roles and responsibilities.
i. Teacher vs. student, doctor vs. patient
ii. Roles surround identities and are connected to institutions. (Swidler: mother,
wife, professor, influential in church= most of her identity is connected to an
institution and our roles within the institution which influences our morals.
b. Moralities attach to those roles
i. You would feel it was unethical if guy at Starbucks won’t sell you a Danish
because he’s saving it for someone else. If professor had a child that was
student @ Berkeley, and was in Swidler’s class and she insisted on grading her
papers herself, but it would be considered immoral because of the roles that
professor has and role that her daughter (student) has.
c. When roles conflict