Sociology chapter 5

Gemeinschaft (118)

A close-knit community, often found in rual areas, in which strong personal bonds unite members.

Organic solidarity (118)

A collective consciousness that rests on mutal interdependence, characteristic of societies with a complex division of labor.

Mechanical solidarity (118)

A collective consiousness that emphasizes group solidarity, characteristic of societies with minimal division of labor.

Gesellschaft (118)

A community, often urban, that is large and impersonal, with little commitment to the group or consensus on values.

Bureaucracy (114)

A component of formal organization that uses rules and hierachical ranking to achieve efficiency. Max weber argued that in its ideal form, every bureaucracy has five basic characteristics.

Alienation (114)

A condition of estrangement or dissociation from the surrounding society.

Ideal type (114)

A contruct or model for evaluating specific cases.

Secondary group (108)

A formal, impersonal group in which there is little social intimacy or mutal understanding.

Formal organizations (113)

A group designed for a special purpose and structurred for maximum efficiency. They have become more powerful and pervasive as society has become more complex.

Out-group (108)

A group or category to which people feel they do not belong.

Hoticultural society (119)

A perindustrial society in which people plant seeds and crops rather than merly subsist on available foods.

Hunting-and-gathering society (118)

A perindustrial society in which people rely on whatever foods and fibers are redily available in order to survive.

Peter principle (115)

A principle of organizational life according to which every employee within a hierarchy tends to rise to his or her level of incompetence.

Iron law of oligarchy (116)

A principle of organizational life under which even a democratic organization will evtually develop into a bureaucracy ruled by a few individuals.

Social networks (110)`

A series of social relationships that links a person directly to others, and through them indirectly to still more people.

Social roles (105)

A set of expectations for people who occupy a given social position or staus

Primary group (108)

A small group characterized by intimate, face-to-face assoiation and cooperation.

Achieved status (104)

A social position that a person attains largely through his or her own efforts.

Ascribed status (104)

A social postion assigned to a person by society without regard for the person's unique talents or characteristics. Generally assigned to a person at birth. Race, gender.

Industrial society (119)

A society that depends on mechanization to produce its goods and services.

Postindustrial society (120)

A society whose economic system is engaged primarily in the processing and control of information.

Master status (105)

A status that dominates others and therby determines a person's general position in society and affect a person's potential to achieve professional or social status. Race/gender.

Postmodern society (120)

A technologically sophisticated society that is preoccupied with consumer goods and media images.

Coalitions (109)

A temporary or permanent alliance geared toward a common goal. Interactionist researchers have noted that groups allow coalitions to form and serve as links to social networks and their vast resources.

Human relations approach (116)

An approach to the study of formal organizations that emphasizes the role of people, communication, and participation in a bureaucracy and tends to focus on the informal structure of the organization.

Classical therory (116)

An approach to the study of formal organizations that views workers as being motivated almost entirely by economic rewards.

Social instituations (112)

An organized pattern of beliefs and behavior centered on basic social needs.They fulfill essential functions, such as replacing personnel, training new recruits, and perserving order. Examples, the mass media, government, economy, family, health care and social institutions.

Scientific management approach (116)

Another name for classical theory of formal organizations.

In-group (108)

Any group or category to which people feel they belong.

Reference groups (108)

Any group that individuals use as a standard for evaluating themselves and their own behavior. Set and enforce standards of conduct and serve as a source of comparison for people's evaluations of themselves.

Groups (107)

Any number of people with similar norms, values, and expectations who interact with one another on a regular basis.

Technology (118)

Cultural info about the ways in which the materials resources of the environment may be used to satisfy human needs and desires.

Ferdinand Tonnies

Distinguished the close-knit community of Gemeinschaft from the impersonal mass society of Gesellschaft.

Max Weber's 5 basic characteristics of bureaucracy

Division of labor, hierarchial authority, written rules and regulations, impersonality, and employment based on technical qualifications. These policies can be undermined or redefined by an organization's informal structure.

Sociocultural evolution (118) Gerhad Lenski

Long-term social trends resulting from the interplay of continuity, innovation, and selection. See Gerhad Lenski

Goal displacement (115)

Overzealous conformity to offical regulations of a bureaucracy.

Social structure (102)

Refers to the way a society is organized into predictable relationships.

Social interaction (102)

Refers to the ways in which people respond to one another. People shape their reality based on what they learn through their social interactions. Social change comes from redefining or reconstructing social reality.

Conflict theorists on social institutions

Say they help to maintain the privileges if the powerful while contributing to the powerlessness of others.

Interactionist theorists

Stress that social behavior is condtionioned by the roles and statuses we accept, the groups to which we belong, and the institutions within we function.

Role strain (106)

The difficulty that arises when the same social position imposes conflicting demands and expectations.

Agrarian society (119)

The most technologically advanced form of preindustrial society. Members engage primarily in the production of food, but increase their crop yields through technological innovations such as the plow.

Bureaucratization (116)

The process by which a group, organization, or social movement becomes incresingly bureaucratic.

Role exit (106) Helen Rose Ebaugh

The process of disengagement from a role that is central to one's self-identity in order to establish a new role and identity.

Role conflict (105)

The situation that occurs when incompatible expectations arise from two or more social positions held by the same person.

Trained incapacity (114)

The tendency of workers in a bureaucracy to become so specialized that they develop blind spots and fail to notice obvious problems.

Gerhad Lenski

Thinks that a society's social structure changes as its culture and technology become more sophisticated, a process he calls sociocultural evolution.

Emile Durkheim

Thought that social structure depends on the dividion of labor in a society. According to her, societies with minimal division of labor have collective consciousness called mechanical solidarity, those with greater division of labor show an interdpendence called organic solidarity.

6 basics elements of social structure

statuses, social roles, groups, social networks, virtual worlds, and social interactions.

The internet

the one significant exception to the trend toward media concentration, allowing millions of people to produce their own media content.