Social Construction Theory And Social Class

Social inequality is a situation where some members of the society enjoy different amounts of wealth prestige and power. The society has placed its members in rankings through unequal economics rewards and power. American society like all other nations has had its systems of socially stratifying its inhabitants. This began from the era of slavery where there was legalized inequality and human ownership among other forms. Zinn portrays this inequality even up to the present where racism acts continue to occur as indicated by the various killings carried out by the police to the black young men with an excuse that they were caught in an act of crime. In the present society, the social class system has dominated the American society. The upper class includes those who are extremely wealthy and they are few, the upper-middle class includes those who have affluent professions like the doctors and lawyers. The other group is the lower-middle class which includes the nurses and small business owners among others with less affluent professions. The others are the working class where most people lie and finally the lower class who are mostly dependants. According to Zinn, American children become conscious of their social class through

Writer Gregory Mantsios in his article “Class in America”, talks about these things, and how wide the gap is between the rich and the poor and also discusses how the rich continue to get richer, while the poor continue to get poorer. Mantsios gives his readers the profiles and backgrounds of three hard-working Americans, two of them are white males, whose family background as well as education played a role in their success, while the other person is a black woman who is just above the poverty line despite her work as a nurse’s aide. Through these profiles, Mantsios article shows exactly how sex, race and shows how your parental and educational background of a person can play a role in the things that you achieve. Mantsios also talks about one’s performance in school and the level of school completed can suggest whether or not class that person may belong in.

Social class describes the different "layers" that exist in society. These "layers," or classes in society, are a division that civilization has been running on ever since the beginning of mankind. In most modern societies, our system of social class division is one of opportunity. We experience a good deal of social mobility, where people through generations or in their own lifetime can move up or down the social scale. By examining the many different perceptions of social class along with S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders, it is illustrated that social class has an impact on people while they are growing up, and will usually deny them from rising above adversity.

It is said that all men are created equal, but this is not all correct. Thomas Jefferson said that “All men are created equally”, but this feeling has been betray if all humans were equal. Then people would all get equal privileges. This is a belief that everyone is equal. Moreover, that they all have the same chance to be successful in life. If humans are, create equally, then why did the government split up the levels of pay rate and social class, and why racism stops people from being what they want to be? In this discussion Gregory Mantsios, the writer of “Class in America”, describes how society has divided into upper class, middle class, and lower class, and that the government is trying to deal with both extremes, forgetting that middle class will face deeper tragedy if it is unnourished. Likewise, Diane Kendall, a sociologist from Baylor University shows how mass media and social class is being frame in her essay “Framing Class, Vicarious Living, and Conspicuous Consumption”. Kendall discusses how many people frame classes and everyday life. In addition, Mike Rose discusses how people just want to live there in life without people bully them. In his, article “I Just Want to Be Average”. He tells the story about some of his experiences throughout high school. When he was a freshman, he was place into a vocational program. Rose goes into detail describing specific events and different types of people that he

USA is a very big country with a lot of people and the social classes are very important. We can see that social class plays big part of people’s life. Everyday people are working, studying, trying to be better. Even though right now it’s time when everyone has many opportunities in his life, anyway there is a gap between classes and groups of people with same features. And your background probably will build your future. And we need to find what kind of class we have right now and look into these classes. The main idea is that Social Classes still exist and it’s most general part of U.S.A society. There are three reasons why gap between groups still exist.

The set of documentaries known as People Like us, revealed how different people tend to perceive and determine someone’s position in society. Measuring social class in American can be influenced by many different factors. In fact, sociologists generally rely on the objective method that determines the class of someone based on their occupation, education, income, and place of residence. Although Americans tend to deny the idea of people being separated by class, it is something that greatly influences the cultural norms, actions, and interactions among all individuals in society.

Race still predominantly plays a role in everyday classism. Discriminatory housing practices traps minorities in the lower class for generations. Moreover, America’s healthcare system unfair to people who have low income. Also, Public transportation does not properly serve the needs of those who use it; as well as, it makes it formidable to secure, and maintain a stable job. Additionally, education for the poor unequal in graduation rates; along with, a social polarization against lower class students. Classism in America is an old, yet consistent problem that, creates an unfair economic divide of

The issue of class is a predominant topic in the world’s social discourse because in every society, there must be the rich and the poor. It is estimated that in this country, there are 38 million people living in absolute poverty. This has created a very huge disparity in the manner in which people live in the society; their lifestyles and general well being. To compound the situation further, the general norm regarding class is that the rich often get richer as days go by while the poor consistently become poorer (Mathews 13). Bell Hooks in her book “Where we stand: Class Matters,” sought to give an insight on the general concept of class as it is today. In this book, the author propagates three main ideas. To start with, Bell argues that the question of class cuts across all other dimensions of life including gender, race, religion and sexuality. Secondly, she posits that religion is has been a very instrumental tool in bridging the gap between classes. Finally, Bell observes that the proclamation that we live in a classless society is flawed in every sense of the world. This paper seeks to make an incisive elucidation of the three observations that Bell makes in her book.

Human beings, as a whole, have generated more than enough speculation as to the origins of mortal nature. Why are we they way we are? Why do we do the things we do or feel the way we feel? Scientists and philosophers have almost always dedicated their causes to the study of biology or religion, continuously giving humanity’s gender, sexuality and identity a basis from a scientific or religious perspective. Science is supposed to be correct. After all, that IS the basis of science. Yet how many times has the world thought to be flat and proved wrong? And the sun, which was thought to be revolving around the earth, was proven incorrect? The theory of social construction seems to be a new introduction to the way we see the world. It is largely possible that a brainwashing through society and media plays a large part of the social disparity between men and women or straight and queer people. Perhaps the innate idea that declares from such a young age that we are to be brought up based on our gender truly has very little to do with science and is instead, based on us as a human race? Social construction theory plays on this idea, accusing society of indoctrination through media, literature, and a sense of ‘normalcy’

Sociology is fluid in the way in which theories become less central to sociological thinking as time progresses. The theory of social class in particular was very prominent throughout the 1950’s-1970’s where social class divisions were seen as central to understanding differences in opportunity and life chances. Social class has been defined as ‘ a division of a society based on social and economic status.’ (1) These theories of social class were developed and studied by the likes of Marx, Weber and Durkheim. The theory of class has been subject to some criticism however since it fails to explain other forms of inequality such as race, gender and sexuality. Although there have been many attempts to link these inequalities to social class, no such connection has been found and other theoretical approaches have been needed from the likes of Andrew Pilkington, Kathwood Woodward and

I feel that the social constructionist concept is valuable, and it’s important to remember the danger in not recognizing the fault of systems in place that shape our views. I like the thought (“…the world is not simply reflected back to us through systems of representation”), but I feel not everyone has access to create or critique systems that help us interpret media (“… we actually construct the meaning of the material world through these systems.”(page 13))

The 21-st century is characterized by the continuous economic downfall. The relationship between race, class and gender should be evaluated to identify the life chances of people to improve their relative position in our socially stratified world. The increased rates of unemployment, homelessness and poverty show that our society requires implementing a transformative approach to reduce social stratification. The term social stratification is applied to identify and asses different forms of inequality that exist in the US society. Patricia H Collins suggests, “while a piece of the oppressor may be planted deep within each of us, we each have the choice of accepting that piece or challenging it as part of the 'true focus of revolutionary change'” (p. 680). Inequality has become a universal feature of our society; therefore, it exists everywhere and concerns race, class, and gender as the key categories of society.

I learned that Constructionists do not believe that knowledge and different concepts are discovered but rather they are made. But even though they don’t believe, they still acknowledge it to be part of reality. Social constructionism is based on a social reality rather than individuals. Constructionism does not answer or they don’t care about ontological questions. I also that social constructionists are open to change if it means that they to need to justify or defend anything that they

Another factor that affects identity is social class. The Marxism assumption is that socio-economic position is a fundamental element to shape identity. People are not individuals, but part of a class. The Marxist ideology is that of “false consciousness”, this meaning that some classes, the lower, working class, are not aware of the position they have to society. As a result, this is why they often work in jobs that are underpaid. Some Marxist theorists believe that class identity is procreated in culture. Pierre Bourdieu believed that class identities are related to cultural activities. One’s cultural preferences are constructed and differentiated by class. Madame Bovary is a good example for this, as she classifies different groups of people socially. Her, being from a lower class, yearning for luxury and wealth. Paris is a place where the upper (middle) class lives a comfortable life, and where she later has an affair with Lèon. Another factor influencing class identity is access to education, which is not equal across the classes. People from the upper classes will have no problem providing their children with an education. Whereas the working class might have difficulties, for example with sending their children to University. Another interesting aspect is the correlation between social classes and voting, as studies have shown that not always do people vote according to their social class. For example, some lower class or “working class” are found to vote for

In the United states, social classes is a controversial issue in terms of defining the actual nature of the classes themselves. Many individuals have categorized the society into three elementary groups that is the “poor”, “middle class” and the “rich”. Additionally, a more complex system of social classes is derived from the three elementary classes. In this regard, a four-class system includes “the capitalist/upper class”, “the middle class”, “the working class” and “the lower class” (Thompson, 2005). Moreover, sociologists have expanded the for-class system into a six class system includes “the capitalist or upper class”, “the upper-middle class”, “the middle class”, “the working class”, “the lower-working class” and “the lower class”.