Sociology exam 3
In the United States the federal poverty line is calculated with reference to food costs, based on the cheapest possible diet that can still provide basic nutrition. What sort of a measure of poverty is this?
A measure of absolute deprivation.
In their book, Schooling in capitalist America, Samual Bowls and Herbert Gintis argued that schools train a labor force with the skills and attitudes nessicary for the heath of a modern economy. What are these skills and attitudes?
A tendency to take orders and perform tasks
What is a sweat shop?
A work place with poor working conditions below standard wages and long hours
What school of social thought insists that all social structures, including systems of stratification, are built out of everyday interactions.
symbolic interactionism
Which of the following population groups are NOT associated with higher rates of poverty?
Asian Americans.
What is the central means by which modern society transmits knowledge, values, and expectations to its members?
Education
How do law enforcement policies make the poor less visible?
Moving the homeless out of high profile locations.
Firms that purposely transcend national borders so that their products can be manufactured from sites all over the world are called?
Transitional corporations
According to Randall Collins, why do members of the lucrative professions like law and medicine support the current education system?
Because they want to keep the number of professional jobs down, thus minimizing competition and ensuring there is a large population of people for the less lucrative, less pleasant professions
What are the benefits of telecommuting?
Businesses get increased productivity and fewer sick days
Poverty can be defined in either relative or absolute terms. How does relative deprivation measure poverty?
By comparing the poor to more affluent members of society.
What do sociologists call an awareness of our own and others' class status?
Class consciousness.
Workplaces where the all the employers must be members of the union are called?
Closed groups
What general predictions can be made about a person's life chances if all that is known is their social class?
Education, Job, who they will marry, how long they will live
Religious groups that emphasize the importance of the literal interpretation of sacred texts are called?
Fundamentalists
The culteral and econamic changes that result from dramatic increases in international trade and exchange are called:
Globalization
What is the means by which modern society transmits knowledge, values, and expectations to its members?
Home schooled children can perform slightly better, on average than public school kids
Which of the following is a serious flaw in the way that the federal government defines poverty?
It doesn't take into account regional differences in the cost of living.
What is true of slavery as a system of social stratification?
It is profitable for the slave owners. It is currently prohibited by every nation on earth. It continues to exist today. There are more people enslaved today than at any other time in human history.
What makes Roger & Me a particularly sociological movie?
It tries to make connections between large-scale social change and individual lives.
What subjects were taught by universities in europe in the middle ages?
Law, theology, medicine
What does Randall Collins recommend to reform the American Social system?
Make it illegal to ask about educational credentials
Which of the following is NOT one of the basic principles of social stratification?
Often low-level groups still have access to all the rewards and privileges of higher level groups.
Who acted kindly towards John Coleman when he went undercover as a homeless person and lived on the streets for ten days?
Other homeless men
Which of the following has the effect of making poverty "invisible" socially?
Residential segregation. Political disenfranchisement. The use of law enforcement to move the homeless away from visible locations. The lack of exposure for successful attempts by the poor to organize.
What do sociologists call it when large numbers of people move up or down the social class ladder as a result of changes in the society as a whole?
Structural mobility.
What is religiosity?
The extent of a persons commitment to religion
According to Chapter 8, what social class do "white collar" workers (employed in technical and lower management positions) belong to?
The middle class.
Chapter 12 points out that the economy is not only about money but also about:
The production, consumption, and distribution of goods and services
What social factor makes it somewhat easier for Sweden to create a more egalitarian society?
The relative homogeneity of race and religion.
What change caused people to migrate into cities from rural areas?
The switch into a manufacturing economy
What sort of social mobility is possible in a caste system?
There is little or no chance of social mobility.
Which is the following is an example of how the hidden curriculum can reinforce inequality?
When are all the professors at college are white and heterosexual
According to chapter 11, what do all religions have in common?
a system of beliefs and rituals that establish a relationship between sacred and profound things
When office workers hang pictures in their cubicals or waste time this is and example of:
individual resistance
When the children of working-class parents manage to attend college and get a job in a professional field this is an example of:
intergenerational mobility.
The difference between a person's ascribed status and their achieved status is measured in terms of their:
intragenerational mobility.
Oscar Lewis was the first to suggest that because they are excluded from mainstream social life, the poor develop a way of life with fundamentally different values and goals, which make it much less likely that they will ever join the middle class. This way of life is usually called: Correct Response
the culture of poverty.
