Hello my name is Emile; The Sociological Perspective Lesson 2

As we wait for students to join class, please read the following:

Emotional Warning: This lesson discusses research about suicide.   (Just a heads up in case that is a traumatic topic for you.)

FYI-

If you want a guided notes packet for this unit, click here to view/download it.

Prep for today's lesson
Good students prepare for each class.  While you wait for your peers to enter, please review your readings from last night.
You will have to demonstrate your ability to both recall the information from the readings and comprehend it.

A NOTE ON CONNECTION ISSUES/LESSONS:

If you ever get disconnected from the Zoom or you can't hear or if you are absent, simply log onto this blog and read the lesson for the day.  As you read, answer the questions in Google Forms as you go along.

ALSO PLEASE BE SURE TO SUBMIT A GOOGLE FORM FOR EACH LESSON THAT WE DO.

INDIVIDUAL BREAKOUT ROOMS - take 5 min to answer the quiz questions below:

Reading Quiz
This quiz will help you see if you can comprehend and recall the readings (Teen-Parent Conflicts and Syllabus) assigned yesterday.  Once we are ready to begin, click here to open the reading quiz in this Google Form.  Open it in a new window and answer the questions as best you can without using your reading.

WHEN FINISHED with the QUIZ, RETURN TO THE MAIN ZOOM ROOM.

Today's Lesson

Once you have finished the quiz, click here for the Google Form for today's lesson and open it in a new window so that you can answer the questions as we go along.  

Questions 1:  Any questions about the syllabus?

Today's lesson:  Emile Durkheim and Structural-Functional Paradigm

Sociology was created as a reaction to the profound changes during the industrial revolution.  The industrial revolution brought about changes from:

• agricultural to industrial economy
• rural to urban living
• cottage system to factory system method of production
• a focus on group membership (tribe, religion, nation, family) to a belief in individualism

Three important thinkers studied these changes and wrote about them which inspired the beginning of sociology as a social science discipline.  Each thinker's theory lead to a paradigm that sociology still uses today.

Structural-Functional Paradigm

The first paradigm we will consider is structural-functional.  This paradigm was created by Emile Durkheim.  Durkheim studied suicide and found that within industrial Europe, the rate of suicide varied from country to country but it also stayed stable within each country.   So, something that seemed like an individual choice, such as suicide, was really a product of the country a person lived in.  Someone living in Britain was much more likely to commit suicide than someone living in Italy.  In other words, something was happening in British society that was creating a problem for the individuals living there.  Suicide was not an individual problem, it was a social one.  Durkheim called these social problems dysfunctions.  

What does Durkheim focus on? 

Durkheim said that societies have a structure made up of different systems that function to keep order in society.  Just like a body has different systems such as a respiratory, circulatory, digestive and nervous system, a society has different systems like family, education, economy, religion and government etc…  These systems serve a function of keeping order in society by creating a structure for stability and continuity.  Therefore, Durkheim's paradigm becomes known as structural-functional.  Durkheim says that when the structures help to make life healthy for individuals, the structures are functional, whereas structures that are not healthy for individuals are called dysfunctional.

Graphic Organizer for the sociological perspective
Download this framework for understanding sociology.  This will be a graphic organizer to help you quickly recall the lessons from this unit and see the connections between them.  After you download the document, find the top of the pyramid as indicated in the picture below:

Then, add the notes for Emile Durkheim's paradigm:

2.  Any questions so far about the beginnings of sociology and Durkheim and his structural-functional paradigm?


Names as an example of Durkheim's structural-functional paradigm

As an example of the structural-functional paradigm,  names, like people, seem individual and unique.  For example, when someone calls your name, you probably look up automatically and assume they are talking about you.  And, indeed, for many of us, we are the only person who we know with our exact name.  I don’t know anyone named Christopher Joseph Salituro other than myself.  

However, names are not a unique trait unto ourselves.  Instead, names are our first connection to community.  Desmond Tutu, the Archbishop of South Africa once said, “A solitary individual is not possible.  We come into being because a community of people came together.”  That community of people gives you a name and sees to it that you survive.  We would not be alive if it wasn’t for their influence and nurture.  So, names are a great way to examine how sociologists look at the world.  Many aspects of our lives that seem like individual choices or individual traits are actually guided by social forces that are larger than us.  Our families, schools, religions, governments and other social institutions all influence who we are, including in ways that we don’t even realize.  The sociological perspective examines these influences from different perspectives.

3.  List any ways that your name: 

• connects to family 
• connects to religion 
• represents morals or values 
• transmits cultural preferences and popular ideas

Some students will say that their parents just chose the name because they liked it.  But closer research reveals that even this is not always the case.  The Social Security Administration Baby Names Database tracks all of the names babies are given each year.  You can view that data here: SSA Baby Name Database.   
Notice that the data shows that names go in and out of style, even if we don't notice it.  For example, my parents named me Christopher, but they just thought that they liked the name.  Looking at the data, it is now evident that Christopher was the second most popular name that year! 

4.  Do you see how your name reflects the influences that come from families, schools/peers, religions, popular culture?  

And do you understand that when people are given a name it can impart values or traditions that connect you to family, religion, or other social structures?  

If you don't understand either of these, please indicate what is confusing.

Additionally, a respected sociologist from Harvard named Stanley Lieberson studied trends and fashions.  He used the Social Security Names database to study how names spread in popularity similar to how fashion spreads.  His research is an example of how the social institution of family creates stability.  The naming of new babies is not simply personal; families influence each other.  Read this NY Times[iii] article about Lieberson then try your own research with the data.  If you wish to markup this reading, download it here.  Lieberson found that:

• Name choices, like clothing choices, reflect the desire to be different, but not too different.
• Names branch off of each other with similar suffixes or prefixes 
• Names reflect societal patterns like Mexican immigrants
• Names are changing more frequently than they used to reflect a stronger desire to be different.

5.  (OPTIONAL) Search the SSA Baby Name Database.  

Can you find examples of any of Lieberson's finds in the social security database?  Give a specific example.

6. Analyze the Teen-Parent Conflict reading using Durkheim.  Using examples from the author, how are school and family functional for teens?  How are they dysfunctional?


7.  The structural-functional paradigm is one perspective that sociologists use.  Can you explain it?  Can you use it to examine your own name?