INTRODUCTION SOCIOLOGY UPDATED EXAMS
SCRIPT QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SET A+
✔✔IBN KHALDUN (1332-1406) - ✔✔Wrote "The Science of Civilization" that predated
Comte and Sociology by 500 Years. His ideas predated Durkheim on Social Cohesion
by 550 years and Mills' insight into Sociology as the intersection of the individual,
society, and history by 600 years.
✔✔Macrosociology - ✔✔Large-scale Sociology
Functionalism
Conflict Theory
Focus on the SOCIAL STRUCTURE
Patterned relationships that persist over time
✔✔Micro-Sociology - ✔✔Small-scale Sociology
Symbolic Interaction
Focus on the SOCIAL INTERACTION
The process by which people act toward or respond to other people
The foundation for all relationships
and groups in society
✔✔WILLIAM ISAAC THOMAS (1863-1947) and DOROTHY SWAINE THOMAS (1899-
1977) - ✔✔As co-founders of Symbolic Interaction, they argued that behavior is the
result of the specific way we look at life based on the views we learn from the groups to
which we belong. Behavior is the result of our subjective reality, not of reality that exists
objectively.
✔✔FUNCTIONALISM - ✔✔Organic analogy
Relationship of parts to whole
Functions (Positive effects in society)
Manifest Functions (Intended functions)
Latent Functions (Unintended functions)
Dysfunctions (Negative effects in society)
, Focus on Stability and survival of society
✔✔CONFLICT THEORY - ✔✔A focus on group conflict
Conflict drives social change
Debunking of ideologies
Society as a battlefield
✔✔SYMBOLIC INTERACTION - ✔✔A focus on the meaning of how people made
sense of the world in an active process of creating meaning through social interaction
Definition of the situation: The subjective way we define the reality of a situation
contained in the norms and values we learn in society
✔✔The Sociological Imagination by C. Wright Mills - ✔✔the awareness of the
relationship between personal experience and the wider society
✔✔Invitation to Sociology by Peter Berger - ✔✔Berger addresses which types of
questions sociologists may seek to answer (such as the consequences of religious
belief) and those which they cannot address (for example, the existence of God).
✔✔CULTURE - ✔✔THE COMPLEX SYSTEM OF MEANING AND BEHAVIOR THAT
DEFINES THE WAY OF LIFE FOR A GIVEN GROUP OR SOCIETY
✔✔NONMATERIAL CULTURE - ✔✔ABSTRACT OR INTANGIBLE HUMAN
CREATIONS IN SOCIETY
✔✔MATERIAL CULTURE - ✔✔PHYSICAL OR TANGIBLE HUMAN CREATIONS IN
SOCIETY
✔✔"Doing Fieldwork among the Yanomamo" by
Napoleon Chagnon - ✔✔Ø This article explores the fieldwork experience of Napoleon
Chagnon, a cultural anthropologist, among the Yanomamo, a group of tropical rain
forest Indians in Venezuela.
· The Yanomamo are isolated from contact with non-Indians and are supposed to be
"fierce" and war like.
· They don't wear much clothing and their sanitation leaves a lot to be desired. This is
mostly an adaptation to living in a hot, humid rain forest.
· Their social life is organized around kinship, ancestral descent, marriage exchanges
and charismatic headmen.
· They use a system of graded threats and violence to test people and in their personal
interactions.
Ø Chagnon's perceptions:
· He was horrified and wanted to go home! His reception by nearly naked tribe members
who were high on hallucinogenic drugs with spears and arrows pointed at him was
startling.
SCRIPT QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SET A+
✔✔IBN KHALDUN (1332-1406) - ✔✔Wrote "The Science of Civilization" that predated
Comte and Sociology by 500 Years. His ideas predated Durkheim on Social Cohesion
by 550 years and Mills' insight into Sociology as the intersection of the individual,
society, and history by 600 years.
✔✔Macrosociology - ✔✔Large-scale Sociology
Functionalism
Conflict Theory
Focus on the SOCIAL STRUCTURE
Patterned relationships that persist over time
✔✔Micro-Sociology - ✔✔Small-scale Sociology
Symbolic Interaction
Focus on the SOCIAL INTERACTION
The process by which people act toward or respond to other people
The foundation for all relationships
and groups in society
✔✔WILLIAM ISAAC THOMAS (1863-1947) and DOROTHY SWAINE THOMAS (1899-
1977) - ✔✔As co-founders of Symbolic Interaction, they argued that behavior is the
result of the specific way we look at life based on the views we learn from the groups to
which we belong. Behavior is the result of our subjective reality, not of reality that exists
objectively.
✔✔FUNCTIONALISM - ✔✔Organic analogy
Relationship of parts to whole
Functions (Positive effects in society)
Manifest Functions (Intended functions)
Latent Functions (Unintended functions)
Dysfunctions (Negative effects in society)
, Focus on Stability and survival of society
✔✔CONFLICT THEORY - ✔✔A focus on group conflict
Conflict drives social change
Debunking of ideologies
Society as a battlefield
✔✔SYMBOLIC INTERACTION - ✔✔A focus on the meaning of how people made
sense of the world in an active process of creating meaning through social interaction
Definition of the situation: The subjective way we define the reality of a situation
contained in the norms and values we learn in society
✔✔The Sociological Imagination by C. Wright Mills - ✔✔the awareness of the
relationship between personal experience and the wider society
✔✔Invitation to Sociology by Peter Berger - ✔✔Berger addresses which types of
questions sociologists may seek to answer (such as the consequences of religious
belief) and those which they cannot address (for example, the existence of God).
✔✔CULTURE - ✔✔THE COMPLEX SYSTEM OF MEANING AND BEHAVIOR THAT
DEFINES THE WAY OF LIFE FOR A GIVEN GROUP OR SOCIETY
✔✔NONMATERIAL CULTURE - ✔✔ABSTRACT OR INTANGIBLE HUMAN
CREATIONS IN SOCIETY
✔✔MATERIAL CULTURE - ✔✔PHYSICAL OR TANGIBLE HUMAN CREATIONS IN
SOCIETY
✔✔"Doing Fieldwork among the Yanomamo" by
Napoleon Chagnon - ✔✔Ø This article explores the fieldwork experience of Napoleon
Chagnon, a cultural anthropologist, among the Yanomamo, a group of tropical rain
forest Indians in Venezuela.
· The Yanomamo are isolated from contact with non-Indians and are supposed to be
"fierce" and war like.
· They don't wear much clothing and their sanitation leaves a lot to be desired. This is
mostly an adaptation to living in a hot, humid rain forest.
· Their social life is organized around kinship, ancestral descent, marriage exchanges
and charismatic headmen.
· They use a system of graded threats and violence to test people and in their personal
interactions.
Ø Chagnon's perceptions:
· He was horrified and wanted to go home! His reception by nearly naked tribe members
who were high on hallucinogenic drugs with spears and arrows pointed at him was
startling.
