Travis Taylor
Dr. Hill
Sociology 402
Final Exam
11 December 2008
Final Exam
Long Essay:
All quarter long our class has been discussing what influences our society, and what exactly causes the complicated process of socialization. Their are many factors such as family, race, peer groups, and the education system. However their are still some that we did not have much time to study, such as the media, social class, ethnicity, race, sex, and gender. In Gerald Handel’s book Children and Society, Handel discusses all of these factors in the socialization process.
Mass communication and the media is both a curse as well as a good thing. A couple of wonderful things about it, we are able to send and receive information much faster than we ever have. With this new technology we are able to keep in touch with people around the globe. The problem with this is the things that we are communicating are not healthy. Through the television internet, and radio, we are sending negative, violent, inappropriate, messages not only to our youth but our whole society. I believe that garbage in is garbage out. For example when all you listen to is bad things such as music with offensive cursing language you when you speak you will be more likely to use offensive language. The same goes for watching violent movies, when you watch a lot of violence you are more prone to be violent. Take for instance I have a friend who loves to watch Ultimate Fighting, however whenever he watches it the next day i always see him trying to wrestle somebody he can’t help himself. If this does this to my friend who is 25 what can it to to the children? According to Handel, “During the 1990’s there were reports on this issue from three prestigious organizations, the Center for Disease Control, the National Academy of Sciences, and the American Psychological Association; all concluded that the mass media contribute to aggressive attitudes and behavior” (Handel 212-213). The media is putting so much in the minds of people in this society.
Our society relies so much on the media to tell us how we should think. The media portrays what they believe to be ideal for our society. They define success as well as what our family lives should be like. They make it appear that our lives should be that of the people in the movies, or on television. They tell us how men and women should be treated differently, as well as what to thinks of people who come from different socioeconomic statuses, people who have different racial backgrounds.
Their are six different social classes according to Handel. First is the upper class, there are very few of them however they have the most wealth and power. The upper class typically live a life of luxury, with multiple vacation homes, fine dining, and many other perks that come along with being extremely wealthy. Below the upper class is the upper middle class. This class consist of “doctors, lawyers, architects, and other professionals that have either been born into or ‘made it’ into the upper middle class” (250). These people are almost always well educated, and have professions that require some sort of degree. The middle class consist of mainly whit collar workers, many of which have a college education. These people are your average business men, teachers, social workers, nurses, police officers, and fire fighters. The working class comes next they consist of your average blue collar workers. They tend to be machine operators, factory workers, auto mechanics, truck drivers, and construction workers. These people have physically demanding jobs that can take it toll on the body. The working poor includes supermarket cashiers, servers in fast food reastraunts, as well as the lowest paid workers in working class occupations. The underclass, “are people with low level of education and few or no marketable skills who work erratically or at part time jobs. Depending on what social class you are from has a impact on how you are socialized and what type of education you will recieive, and what profession will are most likely to go into.
Ones race as well as ethnicity also plays a major role in the socialization process. Ethnicity is based more off of ones culture, it incorporates the language as well as some other social cultural aspects. In order for one to be in the same ethnic group to have a “shared identity they must have a common ancestry and a common culture” (Hadley 265). In an ethnic groups culture it usually involves one or more of the following cultural elements: “a language that is different from the dominate language in the society, a religion, a shared awareness of a historical background that is preserved in stories, legends, songs, costumes, and holidays, and some values and norms that are distinguishable from those of the dominant majority and other ethnic groups” (265-266). Race is considered to be more of a physical labeling it does not truly define who one is, but who society expects them to be. Race and ethnicity plays a important role in the socialization process it is how one is raised and it is part of who they are.
Sex and Gender are one of the most important aspects as to how one is socialized. Sex is the biological part of whether one is a male or a female originally at birth. Gender is what is influenced by society, with gender one is in some way given the choice as to wether be male or female. From birth boys are given blue clothes and girls are given pink clothes, starting the socialization process. From an early age boys are encouraged to do male things and girls are encouraged to do girly things, such as play with dolls and play dress up. Males are taught to be the bread winners for their families to provide a house and to put food on the table. Women are taught how to cook, clean and how to care for the children. Society forces males and females into these positions. Throughout history males have always been considered to be more superior to females. in many cultures women must serve the men. Many of these old fashion ways are still done today although they are considered to be unfair. From birth boys and girls are conditioned and socialized to their specific functions in society.
The media, social class, race and ethnicity, sex, and gender all individually play a huge role in the socialization process. These are all important factors in the way that one is socialized, it is these things that make an individual who they are.
Short Answer:
In the United States a person born of the white race typically has much more of a privilege then one born from any other race. Over the centuries it has be thought that whites should take care of other whites. They believe in building each other up so that they would be able to put people from other races down.
In Tim Wise video he discussed how whites for hundreds of years would fight each other and force the poor to work in the fields of the rich. It was the goal of the rich to never have to work but to have a life of leisure. When the British started making colonies in the Americas they brought over indentured servants to work for them. Eventually these indentured servants received their freedom and received land. Once the indentured servants received rights they worked along side the rich in repressing any non-white people. Slavery became increasingly popular in the colonies and it actually took jobs away form the poor white individuals who had a hard time finding work.
Tim Wise also discussed how the civil war was not fought for states rights but for the right to own slavery. Once the war ended it did not make life any easier for the Blacks, they were still really poor and had to do a lot of physically demanding work.
According to Wise rich white people do not care about any one who is not rich wether they are black or white. Yet the poor whites hate the blacks and feel as if they are so much better then the blacks, even though they have a lot more in common with the poor blacks than they do with the rich whites.
My favorite panel that we discussed so far was the very first one, the panel on education. Although the Symbolic Internationalist did not say much other than labeling children in the education system can be harmful, the Conflict Theorist (CT) and the Structural Functionalist (SF) were arguing back and forth on several different issues. The CT were dicussing how the education system is messed up and unfair, they were complaining about the the school boards, and senators. Then the SF brought it to their attention that the community votes for who they want in the school board as well as the state senators. This of corse made the class laugh because the CT could not come back with a rebuttle.
The next arugment was about how nothing the SF were saying was actually fair, and then one of the SF said that he never said that it was fair it is just the way that it is. I think the class as a whole agreed that the SF did the best job at portraying their perspective. Even though the odds were against them going against the CT they were able to hold their own and I you could have won or lost a panel then the SF would have won. The Structional Functionalist believe that things are the way they are because it works that way it also puts the rich white people a head of the game and makes it harder for other to catch up or get a head. The Conflict Theiroist just find problems with everything they have a difficult time coming up with solutions because they are so focused on finding problems with things.
The talk of death is something that gets avoided in may societies. It is an uncomfortable conversation, which varies among societies. Depending on the culture in which one comes from as one ages and is no longer able to care for oneself they either go to live with family members who care for them, they may go into a nursing home where care will be provided for them, or in some cultures they may commit suicide. I think that it is everyones dream to go quickly and quietly with out any suffering.
Even though death is a normal thing, one day will come where we will die and our life will be over. This is something that will happen to everyone at one point, yet this is something that we avoid talking about because it makes us uncomfortable, we tend to look at death as a negative thing, when in actuality it can be a positive thing depending on what you believe as to what happens to you once you die. Growing old is something that most people go threw and something that mot people have to adapt to, and depending on the socialization process as well as what culture one comes from depends on how the individual will be when they get older.
When Malcolm made hid pilgrimage to Mecca it was a real eye opening experiance for him he began to see society in a way that he had never seen it before. He realized in Mecca that everyone was wearing white it did not matter what color your skin was. It a peared to him that the color of your skin only mattered in America. It was here where he realized that he did not hate the white man, but he did hate the system in which the white man created. Malcolm from here on out that it is not personal and their fore he can not take things personally, but in fact it is the structure that has cause all of these problems, and that we should take all of our anger and frustrations out on the structure and not individual people. It was his spiritual growth that helped him see this, it was not something that he came across on his own.
Malcolm learned a valuable lession from Elijah Muhammad about blindly trusting someone. Malcolm learned at some people are corrupt, including Elijah Muhammad a man who Malcolm really looked up to. Elijah had ordered for Malcolm to be kicked out of the temple and then to be killed. This was a man that Malcolm trusted, but this man also taught Malcolm a valuable lesson about living blindly. When we look up to some individuals we tend to overlook their flaws we do not want to believe that they have any problems or that they are doing anything wrong. We can not have this kind of blindness we should never look the other way we should help each other through rough area’s of our lives not just simply look away.
If Malcolm would have lived I thing eventually the socialization process would have changed. I think he came in at the wrong time in American cicilation I think if he were to come around mayby twenty years ago as a posed to the 1960’s he may have made more of a larger impact on American society. I think their was just too much change too fast during that time in American history, and if Malcolm would have come along a little bit later he may have had a larger impact.
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