The state or practice of having more than one wife or female mate at a time.
Blog
-
Symmetrical Family
A symmetrical family is a family that share male and female roles. For example a woman will go to work just like the man will, a man will take care of this kids and so will the woman. Basically sharing household jobs out fairly whether you are a male or female.
-
Infant Mortality Rate
The infant mortality rate (IMR) is the number of deaths of infants under one year old per 1,000 live births. This rate is often used as an indicator of the level of health in a country.
-
Extended Family
A type of family in which relatives in addition to parents and children (such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins) live in a single household.
-
Nuclear Family
Nuclear family, also called elementary family, a group of people who are united by ties of partnership and parenthood and consisting of a pair of adults and their socially recognized children. The nuclear family was once widely held to be the most basic and universal form of social organization.
-
Sociology and Journalism
Journalism is the gathering of news and information about the state of society, such as current events, trends and issues. Journalists report these news stories aiming to inform large numbers of people through media outlets like newspapers, magazines, radio, television and the internet. In some ways, good journalism and sociology have a lot in common, as both seek to collect information about society, try to avoid deliberate bias, present the information in a balanced and fair way, and the use of evidence they have collected to justify the conclusions they reach. However most journalism is biased and exaggerated, just to attract a larger audience.
-
Sociology and Common Sense
Sociology is concerned with studying many things which most people usually already know something about. Everyone will have some knowledge and understanding of family life, the education system, work, the mass media and crime, simply by being part of and being a member of a society. This leads many people to assume that the topic studies by sociologists and the explanations that sociologists produced are really just common sense or what “everyone knows”. However this is a very mistaken assumption.
-
Sociology and Biological Explanations
Biology or naturalistic explanations are those which assume that various kinds of human behaviour are natural or based on in-nate (inborn) biological characteristics, but if it were so then everyone on planet earth would have the same behavior regardless of where we lived, as people’s biological doesn’t change between societies.
-
Society and Psychology
Like sociology, psychology also studies people and has a range of research techniques and theories to support itself. However psychology tends to focus on the behaviour of individuals, why they come to think and behave as they do and how their minds work.Sociology on the other hand focuses more on social groups, community, organizations and social institutions as a whole.
-
Feral Children
Feral Children are children who, for one reason or another, miss out on some important stages of human learning as they have been removed from human contact and the normal processes of human socialization. They remain unaware of human social behaviour and language from a very early age and therefore fail to develop the behavioural aspects that we would regard as being human
-
Social Processes
Social processes are the various influences that control and regulate human behaviour, and help to keep societies running more or less smoothly and with some day-to-day stability. Two important social processes are socialization and social control.
-
Secondary Socialization
It refers to the socialization that takes place beyond the family and the close community. It is carried out through agencies of secondary socialization such as the education system, the peer group ( a group of people of similar age and status ), the workplace, the mass media and religious institutions.
-
Primary Socialization
Primary socialization refers to socialization during the early years of childhood, and is carried out the family and the close community. It is during primary socialization that children first begin to learn about the basic values and norms and other features of the culture walling up the way of the life of the society they belong to. They also begin to acquire the sense of who they are an individual.
-
How is an individual identified ?
An individual is identified by the following:
▪️ Their age
▪️ Their sexual preference
▪️ Their gender
▪️ Their education
▪️ Their nationality
▪️ Their religion
▪️ Their income and the social class they belong to
▪️ Their occupation and workplace
▪️ Their health
▪️ Their ethnicity
▪️ The region they live in
▪️ Their family
▪️ Their preferred leisure activities
▪️ The goods that they purchase
▪️ How they dress-up -
Consensus Theory
The consensus theory is the approach adopted by functional sociologists. It seems society as a whole working unit, quite similar to a human body. It suggests that just like the human body where every organ depends on the other one in some way to work harmoniously, so does the society. It believes that every individual and institution, they rely on each other to function properly.
-
Conflict Theory
The conflict theory is an approach that sees society as having many social issues and differences, with inequalities in wealth, power and status. All creating conflict between individuals and groups.
-
The Macro and Micro Approach.
The Macro approach is one that focuses on the large scale structure of the society as a whole, while the micro approach is one that focuses on individuals and very small groups of people.
-
Social Policy
Social problems are tackled by the application of social policies. A social policy refers to the plans and actions of national local governments and various voluntary agencies designed to solve social problems and improve the life chances the citizens living in it.
-
Social Problems
Social problems are matters that are in some way harmful to members of the society, and that need something to be done to sort them out or the social balance would collapse, causing a chaos in the society. They cause difficulty, resentment and instability in the society and harm its individuals.
-
Racism
Racism is believing or acting as though an individual or a group is superior or inferior on the grounds of racial or ethnic origins, usually based on skin colour or other physical characteristics, and suggesting that groups defined as inferior have lower intelligence and abilities.
-
Stereotype
A stereotype is a generalized, over simplified view of the features of a social group, allowing for a few individual differences among its members. The assumption that all members of the group share the same features, attitudes and behavioural similarities.
-
Hidden Curriculum
“The Hidden Curriculum” refers to the attitude and behaviour which is taught through the school’s organisation and teacher’s attitudes but which are not part of the formal timetable.
-
Social Control
Social control is the process of persuading or enforcing individuals to conform to the values and norms of a society.
-
Role Conflict
Role Conflict is the conflict that arises between the successful performances of two or more roles at the same time.
-
Consumer Goods
Consumer goods are products and services that people buy to satisfy their need and desires, such as food, clothes, furniture etc.
-
Identity
Identity is about how individuals see and define themselves and how other people in their sociological environment see or define them.
-
Culture
Culture refers to the language, beliefs, values and norms, customs, roles, knowledge and skills which combine to make up the way of life of any society.
-
Social Term : Objectivity
Objectivity means approaching topics with an open mind, avoiding any king of bias, and being prepared to submit research evidence that could prove the research of sociologists of the past, wrong.
-
Social Term : Value Freedom
“Value Freedom” is the idea that the personal beliefs and prejudices of the sociologist should not be allowed to influence the way research is carried out and evidence is interpreted.
-
Socialization
Process by which individuals acquire the knowledge, language, social skills, and value to conform to the norms and roles required for integration into a group or community. It is a combination of both self-imposed (because the individual wants to conform) and externally-imposed rules, and the expectations of the others.
-
Sociology
Sociology is the systematic study of human groups and social life in modern societies. It is concerned with the study of social institutions.
-
How far are family roles equal in the modern industrial societies?
In the modern industrial societies, equal family roles are arguable.It can be said that family roles are equal to some extent but it cannot be denied that some people still live very traditionally. The dominance of women in the professional fields may not prove that women have equal family roles. Even though women are working, they are expected to do all the household, perfectly. The stereotypical view of a family, is still there in the society. People claim to live lives symmetrically but still there is a huge number of families who are cereal packet families. In such a scenario, family roles turn out to be similar to the ones earlier.
Yet, their examples of families which either live symmetrical lives or women hold dominance in the family. There is a growing number of house-husbands in the western societies, in which women work and men do the household chores. There are families in which both the man and the woman work, do the household together and take decision together.
Hence, in a society there are a few places with equal professional and family roles, and a few places who are still struggling to have equal roles. -
Explain why women find it difficult to find equal rights in the family.
The major reason for such inequality is the stereotypical image of a female. This stereotype pictures a woman as financially dependent, with no right to take family decisions and only live as a house-wive. Despite the increasing dominance of feminist ideas in the society, the stereotypical image stays there inconspicuously. Even though women have stepped into the working world dominantly,they still have the same roles or position in the family. Women do work, but they are supposed to fulfill the similar gender oriented family role as earlier. With dominance in finances women haven’t gained a dominant position in the family, to some extent. Women have dominance in the profession but still aren’t given the equal right to take family decisions. However, it would be wrong to say that women completely have no equal rights till date, Currently, women are certainly struggling for equal family roles, but they are places in the society where women are the ones leading their families and taking family decisions. There are places where women are the supreme gender of the family.
-
Explain why are divorce rates high in the modern industrial societies?
In the modern industrial societies divorce is not considered a taboo as earlier, which used to bound people to carry on with their unsuccessful marriages. People now get married with a lot of planning which makes them expect a lot from their partners. And if such expectations aren’t met, it results in divorce.
Women are now independent and are a dominant part of the work-force. At first, the whole purpose of marriage was reproduction of the family, but now social attitudes of the society have changed. Women tend to give more importance to their profession than having children.
Women who at first only used to be housewives are now working women. Women at first were bound within a relationship due financial dependency,but now consider themselves capable enough to lead their lives individually. With an increase in secular ideas and beliefs, people aren’t bound by religious ideology towards marriage. People now exercise their legal rights that religious rights in case of divorce.
People earlier did have extra-marital affairs, but couldn’t get divorced because there weren’t any methods of contraception. Yet, now there are many methods of contraception, which allows people to have sexual activity without being bound in the relationship of marriage. Now families don’t function as they used to in the past. At first all roles were integrated yet now family members play segregated roles. At first people relied on each other in a family, but now people tend to live as privatised nuclear families, which reduces the importance of family and marriage as a whole. -
Understanding Sociology
Sociology and Biological Explanations:
Both, sociology and biological explanations have had contradictory view for several years. Biological explanations concentrate on the anatomy of people to evaluate their behaviour and actions in a society. However, sociology concentrates on different social activities, cultures, norms and socialisation processes to evaluate the behaviour and actions of people in a society. Sociologists argue that according to the biological explanations people with the same genes are supposed to act and behave the same way but the actions and behaviour of children of the same family differ even though they share the same genes. They say that the behaviour and actions of a person are developed once he/she steps into the secondary stage of socialisation. However, it would be false to say that the biological make up of a person doesn’t effect the way he/she might behave in a society. Genes do effect the personality of a person, which usually people refer as the family trait; an action that symbolises the family. Yet, they behaviour and actions may change with the different levels of socialisation he/she may be on and the different social activities he/she may have.
Sociology and Journalism:
The similarity between sociology and journalism is that both tend to research about the social activities in a society, yet have different aims. Journalism is all about creating news and it may limit its research in order to create sensationalised news to gain more views. There might be good journalism where news is based on the facts, yet most of the news is biased or sensationalised. However, sociology aims to research in order to learn about the changing social behaviours and activities in society, and evaluate the reasons of such change by systematic processes. -
AWA Essay # 11
Q. The following appeared in a memorandum issued by a large city’s council on the arts:
“In a recent citywide poll, 15 percent more residents said that they watch television about the visual arts than was the case in a poll conducted five years ago. During these past five years, the number of people visiting our city’s art museums has increased by a similar percentage. Since the corporate funding that supports public television, where most of the visual arts programs appear, is now being threatened with severe cuts, we can expect that attendance at our city’s art museums will also start to decrease. Thus, some of the city’s funds for supporting the arts should be reallocated to public television.”Discuss how well reasoned the above argument is. You will have to consider the assumptions that underlie the writer’s thinking. Describe alternative explanations or counterexamples that might weaken his or her conclusion. You must come up with evidence that would strengthen or refute the argument or identify what changes would make the argument more logically sound.
ANSWER:
The argument states that in a recent study poll, 15 percent more residents said that they watched television programs about the visual arts than was the case in a poll conducted five years ago. During these past five years, the number of people who visited the city’s art museums had increased by a similar percentage. The corporate funding that supports public television, where most of the visual arts programs appear, is now being threatened with severe cuts, as a result the attendance of the city’s art museums will also start to decrease. Therefore, some of the city’s funds for supporting the arts should be reallocated to public television.Firstly, I agree with this argument in general. Television programs about the visual arts have increased the number of visitors of the city’s art museums. People prefer watching television programs about visual arts than other type of program. Visual arts include topics such as painting, drawing, photography, film making, architecture, printmaking, ceramics and sculpture. People are interested in visual arts more than they were before and wish to pursue their careers in this field. As a result, the number of visitors of the city’s art museums has increased greatly. The revenues and profits of the city’s art museums have also improved.
However, there will be fewer number of people as the corporate funding which supports public television are now being threatened with severe cuts. The attendance of the city’s art museums will decrease. This can be controlled if the city’s funds for supporting the arts are reallocated to public television. Public television is the main source of information regarding visual arts. If the city’s funds are reallocated to public television then the attendance would not decrease and everything would be balanced.
In conclusion, in order to control the number of viewers visiting the museum, the city’s funds should be reallocated to public television as it is the main source of information through which people get to know about the visual arts. Public television has increased the number of visitors of the city’s art museums during the past five years. The number of visitors can continue to increase if the city’s funds are reallocated to public television. -
AWA Essay # 10
Q. The following appeared in the editorial section of a corporate newsletter:
“The common notion that workers are generally apathetic about management issues is false, or at least outdated: a recently published survey indicates that 79 percent of the nearly 1,200 workers who responded to survey questionnaires expressed a high level of interest in the topics of corporate restructuring and redesign of benefits programs.”Discuss how well reasoned the above argument is. You will have to consider the assumptions that underlie the writer’s thinking. Describe alternative explanations or counterexamples that might weaken his or her conclusion. You must come up with evidence that would strengthen or refute the argument or identify what changes would make the argument more logically sound.
ANSWER:
The argument states that the general belief that workers are uninterested about management issues is not true. A recent survey states that 79 percent of the 1,200 workers who responded to survey questionnaires expressed a high level of interest in topics related to corporate restructuring and redesign of benefits programs.
Firstly, I agree with this argument in general. The study indicates that 79 percent of the 1,200 workers generate a high level of interest in topics such as corporate restructuring and redesign of benefits programs. This clearly shows that the common notion is incorrect. Corporate restructuring is a process of redesigning one or more aspects of a company. This process of reorganizing can be implemented due to several factors such as positioning the company to be competitive, survive a currently adverse economic climate or poise the corporation to move in an entirely new direction. Corporate restructuring is also used to reduce the cost of operations for the company so that the company profit margin improves. All these factors would improve the company’s image. Furthermore, the company will be able to work and manage their work effectively and efficiently.
Secondly, benefits programs are types of programs that include various types of non-wage compensation provided to employees in addition to their normal wages or salaries. Examples of benefits include, funding of education, social security, profit sharing, group insurance (health, life, dental etc.), retirement benefits, disability income protection and other specialized benefits. The purpose of employee benefits is to increase the economic security of staff members as well as improve the worker retention across the organization. By providing these benefits programs to the employees, the company can ensure that their employees are happy as well as are motivated and determined to maximize the company’s productivity, profits and revenues.
In conclusion, the results of the study are sufficient enough to indicate that workers are interested and keen about management issues. Corporate restructuring would enhance the company’s profit margin as well as operation costs of the company can be reduced. On the other hand, benefits programs would raise the economic security of staff members and the worker retention would improve across the organization. Employees would be content and satisfied with the organization as well as would be adamant in achieving and fulfilling the organizations goals and objectives. -
AWA Essay # 9
Q. The following appeared as part of an article in the education section of a Waymarsh city newspaper:
“Throughout the last two decades, those who earned graduate degrees found it very difficult to get jobs teaching their academic specialties at the college level. Those with graduate degrees from Waymarsh University had an especially hard time finding such jobs. But better times are coming in the next decade for all academic job seekers, including those from Waymarsh. Demographic trends indicate that an increasing number of people will be reaching college age over the next ten years; consequently, we can expect that the job market will improve dramatically for people seeking college-level teaching positions in their fields.”Discuss how well reasoned the above argument is. You will have to consider the assumptions that underlie the writer’s thinking. Describe alternative explanations or counterexamples that might weaken his or her conclusion. You must come up with evidence that would strengthen or refute the argument or identify what changes would make the argument more logically sound.
ANSWER:
The argument states that throughout the last two decades, those who earned graduate degrees found it arduous to get jobs teaching their academic specialties at the college level. On the other hand, those with graduate degrees from Waymarsh University had an especially difficult time finding such jobs. However, better times are coming in the next decade for all academic job seekers, including those from Waymarsh. Demographic trends state that an increasing number of people will be reaching college age over the next ten years; therefore it is expected that the job market will improve significantly for people seeking college-level teaching positions in their fields.
Firstly, I agree with this argument in general. It is clear that people who have earned graduate degrees as well as those with graduate degrees from Waymarsh University have experienced difficulty in finding jobs teaching their academic specialties at the college level. This is expected to change in the future as recent demographic trends indicate that there will be an increased number of people reaching college age over the next decade so the number of positions of teachers will increase dramatically. The job market will improve for people willing to seek college-level teaching positions in their fields. Hence, the unemployment rate will be stable over the next ten years.
Secondly, things will be more balanced and even as compared to the last two decades. There will be greater availability of leisure time, personal incomes will increase, greater number of candidates will enroll in the university as well as the literacy rate of the country will increase. More leisure time will be available as a result families will spend more time outdoors and will participate in recreational activities. Since greater number of students will be admitted to the university, there will be greater availability of vacancies for teachers as a result the literacy rate will rise suddenly. People will live a better standard of life due to an increase in personal incomes. All these factors will eventually balance out the unemployment rate.
In conclusion, in the next ten years graduates from Waymarsh University and those with graduate degrees will likely find jobs as a result the job market will improve for people seeking college-level teaching positions in their fields. In addition, personal incomes will rise, more leisure time will be available, and more students will be joining the university as a result the literacy rate will increase significantly. Furthermore, the unemployment rate will be stable and even in the future. The next ten years can be expected to be prosperous and beneficial for Waymarsh.