Immunity, Community and the Sociological Imagination

HW: Be sure that you have read Sociological Mindfulness by Michael Schwalbe.

Applying Sociology:  The Sociological Imagination and Outliers


Please read the intro from Outliers.

Please answer the following questions on page 31 of your reading packet:

1. Describe life in Roseto.
2. What did Dr. Wolf set out to study originally?
3. What did he find instead?
4. Were the people aware of these effects? Explain.


In the book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell uses a sociological imagination to understand extreme success stories (aka Outliers). Using the introduction to understand sociology we see a few important ideas.
First, sociologists study how people are affected by their social groups. People are influenced by the groups they are a part of, whether it is family, a church, a town, etc. This often contradicts the idea that people are the sum total of their own individual genes and decisions. An important sociologist, C Wright Mills, calls this having a sociological imagination.   The "sociological imagination" is an important theme throughout our semester. The idea of the sociological imagination was developed by C. Wright Mills who said that having a sociological imagination helps one to see the connection between history and biography. That is, who we are (our biography) is determined by where and when we live (history).

Second, we see that sociologists do not simply make opinions or philosophical ideas, rather they make claims based on research and data.

Lastly, understanding sociology can change how we think about the world and who we are. For example, in this excerpt, one might change how he thinks about good health.

Do you see how the excerpt highlights these three ideas? 

The rest of Gladwell's book uses a sociological imagination to explain extreme success stories. For example, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs tremendous success and wealth stemming from the development of computers:

Gladwell describes how being born in the mid 1950s was particularly fortuitous for those interested in computer programming development (think Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, both born in 1955). It also helped to be geographically near what were then called supercomputers, the gigantic predecessors to the thing on which you’re reading this post. Back in the 1960s, when Gates and Jobs were coming of age, a supercomputer took up a whole room and was not something most youngsters would have had a chance to see, let alone work on. But because of their proximity to actual computers, both Gates and Jobs had a leg up on others their age and had the chance to spend hours and hours (10,000 of them in Gladwell’s estimation) learning about programming.

We can apply this model to more than just financial success. Think about what opportunities your own biography and history have afforded you. How has when, where, and to whom you were born shaped your life today?

The Outliers reading provides an example of how the people of Roseto were affected by where and when they live. Because they lived in the town of Roseto at that time, they lived in a way that affected them (without even knowing it) so that they had a much lower chance of getting heart disease and living longer than the rest of the country.  In sociological terms, understanding the effects of when and where people live is called a sociological imagination.

Applying Sociology: Sociological Imagination and School

Recall that a sociological imagination is understanding that an individual's experience is shaped by where and when they live.  If you have questions, please consult my post from yesterday and ask a student sitting near you.  Today, I want you to use data to use a sociological imagination to understand your own life better.  We will compare North Chicago to SHS/Lincolnshire.  North Chicago is just 10 miles northwest of SHS.

Use your sociological imagination to analyze the three data sources below.  Using your sociological imagination, create a hypothesis for each of the three data sources.  Be sure to cite data to support your hypothesis.

1. Compare high school data from Illinois High School Report Card Data here.  Use data from the link to hypothesize how you (and the opportunities presented to you) might be different if you were going to school in North Chicago as opposed to Stevenson.
If you have trouble accessing the website, here is 2018 data for SHS.
Here is 2018 data for North Chicago.

2. Compare the community data from CMAP.  Here are community snapshots for North Chicago and Lincolnshire.  Hypothesize how the data might shape your experience, opportunities, and challenges if you lived in North Chicago as opposed to Lincolnshire.

3. How might this data reveal that some of the private troubles of different students are really public issues:  First, brainstorm with your group, what might be the private troubles of these students?  Then use your soc imagination to think about how living in North Chicago instead of Lincolnshire might be part of the problem.

4. Please use a sociological imagination using this research from the Pew Research Center.  How might this help you understand your own life better?  Cite data.

Another exercise in sociological imagination and college is at this post.  It has some ways of both using data and exploring college and the sociological imagination.

Refer to Ferris & Stein (textbook) pgs. 9-13, 17 for more info.

Are you going to eat that? The Social Construction of Reality; 1SocPerspective Lesson 5

We have learned about three paradigms that influenced the beginnings of sociology as a discipline.  They were the foundations of sociology as a discipline and most of what sociologists study can be viewed through one or more of these three paradigms.  These three paradigms are also three ways of having a sociological perspective.  Other sociologists have tried to explain the sociological perspective in their own ways.  There are three other theories or ways of having a sociological perspective that are helpful and important within the discipline. 

Saliva in a spoon?

The first theory that will develop your sociological perspective involves spitting into a spoon.  Yes, spitting. into. a. spoon.  This is a lesson first published in Teaching Sociology (2003) by Brouillette and Turner and updated in ASA's Trails.  Simply put, the average American will be repulsed by the idea of spitting into a spoon and then swallowing it back again.  However, we are constantly swallowing our own saliva all day long.  But we have defined a difference between saliva and spit.  Saliva is in our mouth and is not gross.  Spit has left our mouths and is gross.



Sociological Literacy: What is the social construction of reality?  What is the Thomas Theorum?

There is no difference between spit or saliva except for how we think about each.  But how we think about each matters greatly to how we feel about the experience.  In other words, our reality is how we experience the world. The social construction is that our society or the people around us influences how we experience the world. Hence our experiences(reality) are created (constructed) by others (society).  This is called the social construction of reality. Spitting in different cultures or different situations (baseball) can be experienced differently, i.e. more or less acceptable.  For example, many of us have been to baseball games and watched players spit all throughout the game. We didn't get repulsed by that.

During one World Series, Reggie Jackson averaged 19 spits per at-bat! Another example is when parents or siblings use their saliva to wipe off a baby's face. We don't find that repulsive, but if a teacher drops saliva onto a desk it becomes gross. This can be true for nearly all of our experiences; feelings of happiness, sorrow, stress, worry. Nearly all of these are created within us by the society we are in.

"Food" as a social construction

Another example is how your society makes you feel about food.  For example, how do you feel about these recipes from Time Magazine or these from AtThirstForFirst.  How would you feel about eating mountain chicken or closer to home is this recipe for Rocky Mountain oysters.


Here is an example that you might not realize. The Japanese would be grossed out by the typical American bathroom. In Japan, toilets are located in a different room than the shower and bath. And the Japanese shower is always separate from the bath. They see the shower for cleaning and the bath for soaking after you have cleaned. 


Another way social construction can be illustrated is in our symbols and how they shape our reaction. For example, there is a feeling that you should not walk on the Patriot.



There is no real reason why, but it is a social construct. Finally, another example is the faculty restrooms. Some of the restrooms are for individual use, which is one person at a time. These restrooms are exactly the same: one toilet and one sink. However, the rooms are labeled with "Men's" and "Women's" signs. That makes men feel weird if we use the "women's" room, even though the men's room is exactly the same. (and vice versa). The sign is a social construct that elicits that feeling.  There is a restaurant like this at Voodoo Donuts in Austin, TX.  The donuts themselves challenge our feelings about what a donut should be, but the bathroom goes even further.

Applying social construction of reality to teen-parent conflicts:

How is the idea of "teenager" an example of a social construction?

How does the article say that the idea of "teenager" gets constructed?

What is the reality of "teenager" to adults?  To the teens themselves?

                 

What are some moments in your own life where you experience these feelings, but when you stop and think about it, you realize that the feelings have been created for you by society?

Applying social construction of reality to your own life:

Think about  something from your own life; your religion, sports, fashion, or something.  How can social construction of reality apply to your life?

Hello, My Name is Max; Symbolic Interactionist Paradigm: The Sociological Perspective Lesson 4

Please review the lesson from yesterday.  Please explain the answer to one of these questions with the partner at your table or someone near you.  If have trouble explaining the answer, please discuss it with your partner or a neighbor or ask me.

What does Marx's conflict paradigm focus on?

How might the conflict paradigm be used to examine teens?

Max Weber and Symbolic Interaction Paradigm

Max Weber's contribution to the development of sociology during the  Industrial Revolution

Max Weber (pronounced VAY-ber) studied the development of capitalism in European countries.  He found that countries that became more Protestant also became more capitalist.  This is peculiar because religion and economics seem to be separate.  But Protestants held shared meaning with each other about their wealth and finance.  They saw living within their means and investing their money as signs that they were living righteously within their Christian beliefs.  This created an economy that was based on investment.  It led to the creation and expansion of capitalism, investing profit to make even more profit.   It might seem strange for religion to be connected to the economy, but in their interaction with each other, it was real for them.  


The development of the symbolic interactionist paradigm 

Building off of Weber's work, two sociologists created a third paradigm for which sociologists view the world.   The symbolic meaning in the Protestants' lives was in their everyday interaction with other people.  Stemming from Weber's work, Randall Collins and George Mead focused on the shared meaning in everyday life between people.  This paradigm became known as symbolic interaction.  It is usually more focused on face-to-face interaction, or small groups, as opposed to large scale institutions.  Much of our interaction with each other holds symbolic meaning to us.  The words we chose, our body language, our clothes all hold symbolic meaning for us.  They convey an identity we have to the world. 

Let's add Weber and symbolic interaction to the graphic organizer:

How might symbolic interaction paradigm connect to names?

A name isn’t just a random set of syllables.  It has meaning.  

And it can be interpreted by people differently.  Read "Conventional Wisdom Tells Us...What's in a Name? That which we call a Rose by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet" from Cerulo and Ruane.

According to Cerulo and Ruane, what are the different meanings that names hold?  How do these meanings affect people?

For more on names and symbolic meaning, you can listen to the Freakonomics podcast episode by Wells, Katharine.  How Much Does Your Name Matter? Freakonomics Radio Podcast. April 8, 2013.

The episode draws from a Freakonomics chapter called “A Roshanda By Any Other Name”and includes a good bit of new research on the power of names. It opens with a conversation with NYU sociologist Dalton Conley and his two children, E and Yo. Their names are a bit of an experiment.  Indeed, there is some evidence that a name can influence how a child performs in school and even her career opportunities. There’s also the fact that different groups of parents — blacks and whites, for instance — have different naming preferences. Stephen Dubner talks to Harvard professor Latanya Sweeney about a mysterious discrepancy in Google ads for Instant Checkmate, a company that sells public records. Sweeney found that searching for people with distinctively black names was 25% more likely to produce an ad suggesting the person had an arrest record – regardless of whether that person had ever been arrested.  Names do, however, reveal a lot about the people doing the naming. Eric Oliver, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, talks about his new research (with co-authors Thomas Wood and Alexandra Bass) that looks at how children’s names are influenced by their parents’ political ideology.

If names do affect their bearers' chance of success, it may not always be because of the reactions they cause in other people (the "looking-glass self"), they might also be because of "implicit egotism", the positive feelings we each have about ourselves.  Brett Pelham cites the concept in explaining his finding that individuals called Virginia, Mildred, Jack and Philip proliferate in Virginia, Milwaukee, Jacksonville and Philadelphia - he believes they are drawn to live there.  

Another intriguing 2007 paper, entitled Moniker Maladies, found that people's fondness for the initials of their names could get in the way of success. Leif Nelson and Joseph Simmons analysed almost a century of baseball strikeouts and found that hitters with the initial K had a higher strike-out rate ("K" denotes a strike-out in baseball). They also found that graduate students with the initials C and D had a slightly lower grade point average than A and B students, and A and B applicants to law school were more likely to go to better colleges.

Parent-teen conflicts and Weber's symbolic interaction paradigm

Think about the teen-parent conflict reading.  What are the meanings that "teen" might hold for parents?  For society?  How might this affect their treatment?  How did this meaning come about?