Social Studies

• Functions of the Family

  • Provides emotional & Material security
  • Agent of primary socialisation
  • Education
  • Transmission of culture
  • Establishes class status
• Reasons for difficulty creating universal definition of family

  • Cultural differences
  • Changing structures
  • No one universal agreement on functions of the family
• Polygamy


  Marriage between 2 or more people
• Monogamy


  Marriage between 2 people
• Patriarchy


  Social system where MEN have authority
• Matriarchy


  Social system where WOMEN have authority
• Exogamous


  Marrying outside your social class
• Endogamous


  Marrying within your social class
• Matrilineal


  System that traces lineage through WOMEN
• Patrilineal


  System that traces lineage through MEN
• Functions of the family

  • Socialization eg. teach norms, values & traditions
  • Economic cooperation eg. families working together (farming)
  • Emotional Support eg. provides sense of belonging *crucial*
  • Gender Roles eg. traditional roles Men: Breadwinner Women: domestic duties
• Family Orientation


  The family you grow up in
• Family of Procreation


  The family you create on your own
• Socialization


  The process by which we learn the norms and values in society
• Types of Socialization


  • Primary: Parents & family teaching norms and values
  • Secondary: Influence of external agents eg. friends, School
• Norms


  Provide order in society. Expected Standard's of behaviour, unwritten rules of beliefs, attitudes and behavior
• Culture


  A set of accepted behaviour, values & assumptions determined by where we live, laws, social system history. Dictates our understanding of acceptable styles of behaviour. *Learned
• Social stratification


  Socially patterned Inequality of access to things, a system a society ranks categories of people
• Basic Systems of Social Stratification

  • Slavery
  • Caste
  • Estate
  • Class
• Caste System


  Closed Stratification systems which people can do little or nothing to change their social standing. Remain in their whole life. Assigned jobs regardless of their talents or interests
• Caste System


  • Dalits
  • Shudras
  • Vaishyas
  • Kshatriyas
  • Brahmins
• Types of Social Mobility

  • Intergenerational mobility: Children can change occupation/ class relative to that of parent
  • Intragenerational Mobility: Children can change occupation |class during their own life
• Reasons why it is difficult to define class

  • Differences of opinion/definition to what class is
  • Changing nature of industry
  • Not widely studied academically
• Types of Discrimination


  • Direct: Treating someone less favourably then others because of a protected characteristic. eg. disability
  • Indirect: When rules that apply to everyone have a disadvantage for groups with a protected characteristic
  • Unconscious: Quick judgement made about others, Outside our conscious awareness
• Discrimination


  Unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people on the grounds of ethnicity, age, sex or disability
• Examples of discrimination Travelers face

  • Denied access to places
  • Physical abuse
  • Hate speech
• Laws that tackle the issue of discrimination

  • Equal Status Act
  • Employment Equality Act
• Groups covered by these laws

  • Travellers
  • Genders
  • Ethnicity
  • Civil Status
  • Disability
  • Age
• Sociology


  The study of social life, social change and the social causes and consequences of human behaviour
• Reasons why Sociology can never be as objective/Scientific as Natural Sciences

  • You can't apply science to human behavior (distinct from nature)
  • Person Observing brings their own objective
  • Sociology can't be completely based on natural science pattern
• Founding fathers of sociology

  • Marx
  • Durkheim
  • Weber
• Marx believed that religion had certain practical functions in Society that were similar to the function of opium in a sick person