SUMBLOG12 Anthony Giddens

Our society has come a long way in such a short amount of time.  We started at a pre-modern society, then we transit to modernity, and finally here we are at post-modernity.  However the term and concepts of “post-modernity” is not accepted by everyone.  One such person that does not accept the concepts is Anthony Giddens who rather call it radicalized modernity, and assert his own ideas to it.  To me, Giddens’s radicalized modernity have been one of the more difficult concept for me grasp.  From my understanding, Giddens use radicalized modernity to contrast with post-modernity because the concepts for post-modernity are outdated.  The examples of architecture and art that was mentioned in class help really helped make sense of this.  When we think of a skyscraper, we often think of a tall rectangular looking building.  This is the same case with post-modernity because when we look at it we again often see only one thing.  However, that is only our preconceived notion of it, and if we were to focus on the design of each building, we can then see the uniqueness of said building.  This is the same with humans as well because, although we are a part of a society as a whole, each individual within it are different.  Now let’s take a look at art.  Art is always changing; the arts from the past are a lot different from what we considered as art to today.  Just like the concepts of post-modernity and Giddens’s rationalized modernity.  They are different styles of thinking, because one is thought of sometimes ago when society was still young and the other is more modern to fit more mature society.  I’ll like to use the evolution of dance video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMH0bHeiRNg) to help demonstrate this.  The video shows how dance evolve throughout the ages.  At the time a particular kind of dance may seem as cool but looking back it just look silly.  I am sure ten years from now we’ll look back and realize just how stupid twerking really is if not already.  So like I said before Giddens social theory is one of the more difficult topics for me to grasp, and I could be entirely wrong on the subject.  So feel free to drop me a comment and critique it.  I’ll appreciate it very much.

SUMBLOG11 Dorothy Smith

To truly know a cultural you have to spend time in that cultural.  This is the basic principle of Dorothy Smith’s standpoint approach theory.  Just like the documentary that we saw in class, we can’t judge a person based on looks alone.  The homeless street venders on the documentary were seen by some as lazy bums.  These same people also suggest that they stop doing what they are doing because it is not helping the local market and it gives a bad vibe to tourist who comes to visit their city.  However as the documentary stated, these venders are actually somewhat helpful within said community.  They all look out for one another and act as a cheap alternative for people who like a good bargain on book.  They also provide tourist with more useful information about places they should visit than those travel guide booth.  So for those people who may have a negative view on others, just spend some time getting to know them and maybe they could make a new friend.

Nerd culture use to be view as a gross and weird thing to be into.  Kids in school would always pick on the nerdy kid who spends most of their time reading comic books, playing trading card games, and always on the computer.  Little do they know that these kids would one day grow up to be a Bill Gates or Steve Jobs.  Due to the impact of this tech geniuses made in the main stream industry, people now are getting exposed to this cultural and thus are now more accepting of it.  Each year it seems like the film industry is coming out with a new superhero movie based off comic books.  People who did know about these superheroes are now becoming more knowledgeable with them, while these “nerds” have been exposed to them there who life.  Show like the Big Bang Theory is successful because they are using nerdy humor to entertain the audience.  Here is a clip from the show that will help demonstrate this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9R5w4Qz6pVk).  So what I am trying to get at is don’t judge a culture before you even get to know it, because one day it might just become the one that you enjoy being involve with the most.

SUMBLOG10 Talcott Parsons

I find Talcott Parsons concept of pattern variable very useful.  I say this because the way people deal with certain situations can be explain through 1 of the 5 variables.  If you don’t deal with it in a certain way, then you are going to deal with it using another method (Patterns).  What I mean by this is that there are only so many ways that we can actually use to interact with each other, therefore Parsons’s 5 variable helps us understand why humans behave in these patterns.  The first pattern is the affectivity-affection neutrality pattern.  This pattern basically states that we are expected to have a more intimate relationship with the people we are close with, and act neutral with the people we don’t.  This make sense because, who would want to share personal information to strangers.  The second pattern is the diffuseness-specificity, which is a person’s willingness to help other.  Again, people are more likely do things for people that they know rather than people that they don’t.  Universalism-particularism is the third pattern.  Form my understanding of this is being a law abiding citizen VS hermit.  People are supposed to follow laws to ensure a safe environment, which is the norm.  However, a hermit is someone who chooses not to follow the norm and do what they see fit.  The fourth of these patterns is achievement-ascription.  The best that I can explain this pattern is people do the things they do to achieve a goal.  The last of these patterns is the collectivity-self-orientation.  What this is is if a person is in it for him/herself, or for the group.  An example of this is a ball player wanting the ball more to raise his stats VS working together with the team to achieve something greater.  I like to use this video of Italian striker Mario Bolitelli to showcase this (https://www.youtube.com/watchv=Ea6t_FCQ6Vc).  As you can see he clearly had a chance to put his team ahead in the game.  Instead he chose to showboat and brings instead the attention to himself. He is a prime example of a selfish individual.   In conclusion, in my mind I think that these five patterns really have an influence on our behavior in one way or another.

SUMBLOG9 Erving Goffman

I think Erving Goffman hit it on the head when he came up with his Presentation of Self idea.  I too believe that we as humans live out our lives as if we were actors in a play or movies.  Think about it, we put ourselves though school so we can obtain the necessary skills to get our ideal jobs.  Thus establishing what our status and role will be in society.  If someone happens to be a salesman at a store that specializes in video games, we would expect that his/her role is to be knowledgeable about the different types of games, and help people who are clueless about it make the right decision when purchasing a video game.  Just by knowing that the person was hire to work at that store already gives us an idea of that person’s capability, and again has established a role for him/her.  However, if we lack the skill and don’t get hire due to lack of experience, isn’t that the same as an actor not getting the part of a role due to someone else being more experience?  Relating to status and roles, aren’t we always trying to impress an audience?  According to Goffman, the power of the audience is very influential because the audiences have expectations, and those expectations needs to be fill.  Let’s take the salesman again as the example.  If the salesman fails to do his/her job or does it poorly, then the members of the audience can report him to higher management, and he/she can be discipline or potentially fired.  So by comparison with a play/movie, if the actor/actress does not perform as well as thought to be, there may be negative impacts in the future.  What I mean by this is that, if a an actor/actress fails to deliver on a role, then in future projects that that person is in, the audience will turn a blind eye because that person is associated with negativity base on one bad performance.  This is the case with Ben Affleck, which can be found in this news article (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-207_162-57599811/ben-affleck-to-play-batman-in-man-of-steel-sequel/).  Due to his bad performance in the movie Daredevil, fans of comic books are booing the decision to make him the new Batman in the upcoming Man of Steel sequel (http://io9.com/the-50-greatest-tweets-about-ben-afflecks-casting-as-1188521731).  Although he has redeemed himself since then, people will never forget that he fails to deliver as Daredevil.  So overall, Goffman’s idea takes a modern look on society, which makes it so relatable.

SUMBLOG8 George Herbert Mead

I find George Herbert Mead’s view of “the self” quite fascinating.  We live in a world where people like to generalize each other based on their looks and their status.  In other words there are standards that are set upon us on how we should act in society within the cultural norm.  What I mean by standard is if you are a famous athlete you must act humble and try to be role models for the younger generation. With these standards put in place on people, it’s no secret why we will never truly “know” who or what a person really is.   This is where the “I” and the “me” come into play.  The “me” is objective part of a person which is the part that they want to be projected as.  The “I” is the subjective part of a person, which are the inner thoughts or raw emotions.  The two works hand in hand to help balance each other out.  The “I” may want to do something, but the “me” may tell a person to think otherwise, which in this case help the person makes the right decision.  Social media is a great way for people to play around with the “me” part of them.  They can be view as someone else without any precaution.  Take online gaming as an example, some people sure talk big during gameplay even when their behinds are getting kicked.  They might act this way during gameplay, but I doubt that they’ll act this way in public.  Superheroes are no strangers to the “I” and “me” concept.  The heroes wears a mask to hide the “I” or their true self from the public.  This is usually done so to keep them safe, and to protect the people important to them.  But they mainly wear the mask so that people won’t treat them differently or fear them while in human form.  While the “me” helps them display what they really want to do, because the mask becomes a filter that allows them to display their true intention, which is to help people.  Like this scene from the movie Spiderman 2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVX-cUJGdxs).  This scene does a good job at telling us that there is a hero in each and every one of us.  We just need to find a filter to display it.

SUMBLOG 7 Anna Julia Cooper

As a minority of this society I can relate to a lot of Anna Julia Cooper’s ideas of pluralism, assimilation, segregation, and genocide.  Growing up I was made to believe in pluralism, where everyone regardless of ethnicity can all live as equal.  However, seeing how some studies have showed that this really isn't the case and from some personal experiences, my view of pluralism has changed.   Rather we may see it or not there is still a great deal of racism going on today.  This brings us to assimilation, and how I think the two kind of relate to one another.  Assimilation is the process of conforming a group into the dominate group.  However not many minorities have all the necessary skills to conform, and thus refuse to do so.  This is often seen as a negative, and I think some form of racism can rise from this.  If a person does not assimilate, than that person is often out caste and is somewhat hated.  Although segregation of race is no longer a law, I often see it unintentionally.  I often see this when I visit my younger sister’s high school or simply walking through the cafeteria here on our campus.   I often see whites sitting with whites, blacks with blacks, Asians with Asians. Etc.  We are supposedly be a diverse community, but that isn't the case at all.  Finally the last thing I want to talk about is genocide.  My family was given the chance to come to this country because of our involvement to help the USA during the Vietnam War.  After the US pulled out of the war, the Vietnamese was trying to rid of us because of our involvement.  My family escaped to refugee camp and eventually was allow to come here.  What I am trying to get at with this is that Cooper’s idea is still relevant today.  The US is supposed to be a melting pot of people.  I don’t really believe that because the idea of everyone becoming one in a pot just disturbs me.  I like to view the US as a salad bowl, because we are all represented in the bowl with a unique flavor.  The picture below helps demonstrate this.

SUMBLOG5 Harriet Martineau

Harriet Martineau who is often regard as the first female sociologist, really made a name for herself when she introduced her view on society to the world.  Her ideas such as the “laws” of social life and morals and manners are especially interesting to me.  They are interesting because it basically explain how people should act in society.  Martineau “laws” of social life says that human happiness is express through the fairness of our society.  What I got out from this is that if the government (society) treat everyone citizen equally, then people would in theory be happier.  Happy people mean more productive people, and with more productive people then the government’s economy can thrive.  However this is also one of her greatest critique, mainly because of the vagueness of the idea itself.  Although the idea does look good on paper, is it possible to achieve?  We live in a capitalist government where everyone is in for themselves, thus rendering this idea useless.  The example in class about the country Bhutan shows that a government measuring people’s happiness would not last long.  Secondly is her idea of morals and manners, and this idea is pretty self-explanatory.  It’s about the shared norms that people of a particular society have, and the action that we take based on those norms.  I really like the example that we use in class about men needing space in between urinals.  There are no written rules that say that no two men should ever pee next to each other.  However, in our society we view going to the bathroom a private matter.  Thus when going to use the urinal in public we like to give them space, so things don’t get awkward. I thought of the image below when the idea came up in class and I believe it helps demonstrate this idea.

SUMBLOG4 Max Weber

Max Weber really hit it on the head with his idea of bureaucracy and rationality.  What I really take an interest in is his six basic characteristics of rationality.  This idea in my opinion is what keeps everybody’s life in order?  For an example we as humans are afraid of change and we like things consistent.  We like to know what we are getting.  Let’s take a look at a franchise restaurant such as Denny’s.  When you walk into a Denny’s you are expecting the same service and the same food every time.  Now imagine if you walked into a Denny’s and receives a totally different experience and different food. In this case you would probably freak-out, because I know I would.  You would expect a certain level of efficiency from them because you were promised it.  Going off this idea, I think you can relate it to religion as well.  We got rules and religions all design to keep us save, but when those rules start getting broken we start questioning our faith.  What I mean by this is if we believe in something all our life but along the way found it to be false, that will shake and scare us a bit.  So I guess what I am trying to say is that rationality helps us cope with daily activity with a guideline and if these guidelines were to change it’ll impact us for the better or for worst.  I am using a picture with a quote from one of my favorite movie The Dark Knight to help illustrate this idea, which can be found below.

SUMBLOG3 Emile Durkhiem

I really like Emile Durkheim’s ideas on suicide.  I say this because it’s really hard to explain why anyone would commit suicide, and he manages to narrow it down to four logical categories (egotistic, altruistic, anomic, and fatalistic).  With all the suicides that I had ever heard about, I can usually fit them into one of these four categories.  First, let’s take a look on anomic suicides.  Anomic suicide from what I understand results when there is a change in the economy that negatively impacts people financially.  I've heard about people committing suicide after learning that they have lost all the money that they have invested.  Secondly, let’s look at fatalistic suicides.  Fatalistic suicide occurs when there is a high degree of regulation. Institutions such as prisons are where most of the fatalistic suicides occur.  I can understand to why people would rather die than spend the rest of their days in prison.  Many bad things can happen to a person in prison (i.e. rape, unsanitary living condition, bullying, etc.).  So it’s easy to see why some would choose death rather than succumbing to that kind of treatment. Thirdly, let’s discuss altruistic suicides.  Altruistic suicide occurs when a person commits suicide for the good of the group.  This can be both a good and a bad thing.  Take a soldier covering a live grenade to protect his brother in arms.  He is gives his life, so his brothers can live. This is taken to be a good deed.  However sometimes it may not like the kamikaze attackers during WWII.  They attacker is sacrificing himself for the good of the group, but at what price.  The person dies and other countless dies, so is it really worth it in the end.  Nonetheless there is a reason as to why people would do such things good or bad, because it’s for the good of the group.  Lastly let’s talk about egotistic suicide.  To put it simply this type of suicide occurs when a person feels excluded.  A prime example of this is bullying.  Suicides that was committed as a results of bullying continues to be on the rise.  With the internet, cyber bullying is becoming bigger and bigger.  I saw this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XLcfdkkHQE) a while ago and it shows the effect of bullying, and I think it does a good job of it too.  So it’s easy to see why this type of suicide is the most talked about.  Overall I believe that Durkheim’s idea stood the test of time because it is still relevant today as suicides keeps on happening, and we trying to figure out why.

SUMBLOG 2

I really like Karl Marx’s consequences of capitalism, because it still applies in today’s society.  Capitalism divides people of society into two groups: the working class and the rich (Social Organization).  We have the rich controlling the vast majority of the wealth and the working class works their butts off just to get by and feed their families.  So to create the illusion of equality the government taxes the rich more than the working class to keep order.  However taxing the rich a little more does not impact their luxurious lives in any way.  It was like this way back when the idea was introduce, and it’s still dividing us today.  Another idea that withstood the test of time is our fetishism of commodities.  Goods and services are the driving force of any capitalistic government.  Without it the idea of a free market wouldn't exist, and thus no one could turn in a profit or obtain certain goods.  However, let’s get back to the idea of our fetishism of commodities and how it applies in today’s society.  We are always wanting new and technology, even though the older ones we currently have works just as fine if not just the same as the newer ones.  Let us take the iPhone for an example.  It seems like every year a new model comes out, with “newer features”.  From my experience these new features are minor and somewhat unnecessary.  Despite this, consumers continue to pour money into the new devices.  There is this news article that was recently published by abcnews.com that talks about this, and can be found on this link (http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/gold-iphone-5s-high-prices-ebay/story?id=20357575).  I think this is a prime example of our fetishism of commodities.  Last but not least is the alienation of the “species of being”.  I like this idea because it explains a lot about humanity and human potential.  I make an item from scratch; my friend sees that item and wants it.  I decided to help him make one, and now we both have that same item.  So in a way we are connected, and that is our human potential as a whole.  So again I really like Marx’s idea of capitalism.  It was ahead of his time, and we still talk about it today.