Social Norms and Control: Notes - Sociology

Social facts: - Durkheim defines this as " ways of acting, thinking, and feeling, external to the individual, and endowed with a power of coercion, by reasons of which they control him." - Facts exist apart from social interpretation - Social facts need to be treated as things -...

Social facts: - Durkheim defines this as " ways of acting, thinking, and feeling, external to the individual, and endowed with a power of coercion, by reasons of which they control him." - Facts exist apart from social interpretation - Social facts need to be treated as things - They can use coercive power over an individual - Social facts are independent of and resistant to the will of any individual. They can strain the individual, and it is possible to free ourselves from them. - It is not a moral judgement. The social facts remain Social Facts: - Every individual will exercise their rights and duties in a way that consistent with the laws and customs of their society - The laws and customs of our systems started before we were alive, and will continue after we die - They will continue to have power over us whether we are aware of it or not - If we want to be understood by others, we have to speak a language they understand - Durkheim states that social facts are not amenable to common-sense understanding - The sociologist must put himself "in the same state of mind as the physicist, chemist, and physiologist when he probes into a still unexplored region of the scientific domain" - Social facts are thus the values, cultural norms, and social structures which transcend the individual and are capable of exercising social control Norms: - Social norms- expectations of conduct in particular situations - These are dependent on how society accepts them, how society transmits them, and how much conformity people require - Some social norms may require considerable force to enforce - Social norms fare passed on from generation to generation - Norms allow for social order - Ideal cultural norms can be inferred from observation of what people say, sanction, or react against - Proscriptive vs prescriptive norms: - Proscriptive norm tells people what they shouldn't do - EX. Don't laugh at funerals, etc. - Prescriptive norm tells people what they should do - EX. Brush your teeth before school in the morning, etc - Norm vs "being norm" - Having pierced ears is common, not a norm - Norms vs rules - Not clear-cut rules - It's a social entity - A shared group guideline - They don't operate in society, they're created, maintained, and promoted in society - A rule comes for an authority and are formulated individually and then imposed on others - They both direct behaviour and are quite necessary for maintaining social stability and order - Norms can vary across social location - Construction workers display different attitudes then college students - Your social norms depend on your location - The social norms at school are different then the social norms while with friends - The importance of social norms: - They are informal controls: a collection of unspoken rules, guides, of standard behaviour that prevail in any society or organization - We create these rules ourselves and enforce them ourselves - We obey them because we view it as normal and legitimate Case study: The unwritten rules of Christmas - Theodore Caplow's (1984) study of "Middletown" America - The gift selection rule: - It should be something the recipient will like, something that surprises them, and the appropriate price range - The Reciprocity Rule: - Everyone should be giving one gift to all the important people in their life - The scaling Rule: - The most expensive gift should be given to your spouse. The children should receive equal amounts of gifts - These practices show social control without any written rules - There's no actual response to someone who doesn't follow these rules Social Control: - Sometimes called informal control, is the regulation of behaviour by other people in ordinary social settings, without official rule- enforcement - Devised by society. It is not genetically encoded into us Social Integration: - Informal vs formal social control - Informal control is the regulation of people's behaviour by other people in ordinary social settings - Formal social control is the regulation of people's behaviour through things like laws, police officers, jails. Any formal court procedure. Contributes to integration and regulation in society. - Social control have been used to regulate society without the use of force - Durkheim: "laws and punishments, politics, language, religion, economics, and professions are all concerned with reproducing social facts that shape people's behaviour - We don't recognize these informal controls and coercion. We just view it as personal views Strategies of control:m - Used to maintain boundaries and regulate the activites of its members and to perpetuate order. This is done in 2 ways: - Social sanctioning- administering of rewards and punishments - Social management- agents of social control shape people's social settings - The chairs are faced a specific way in a lecture room to maintain order Social sanctioning: - Persuasion: a process of advising aimed at convincing the listener to take specific course of action - The effectiveness of persuasion is dependent on the credibility of the speaker - Micro sociologically it is a process of coaxing someone - Macro sociologically it is done through claims making. This is a process by which groups create and promote claims that will be granted credibility by the mass public Shame: - Capitalizes on fear - A sense of disgrace or embarrassment arising form the memory, or exposure, of dishonourable and offensive acts - Rooted in social norms that's caused disgrace Guilt: - The remorse a person feels for breaking a rule or committing a shameful act - Shame and guilt have different effects on personal development, leading to different emotions and behaviours - Guilt is associated with deviation from moral standards that we hold ourselves to - We feel shame when we let others down, we feel guilt when we have let ourselves down - Guilt produces a postive behavioural change - Shame makes you feel angry or withdrawn - Gossip: the practice of idle talk or rumour - A very powerful social control - Also based on fear - Its so powerful because it can spread shame or guilt and can undermine a person's reputation - We can easily separate the truth from the falsehood which adds to its power - Works best in small settings where people share a common value system and people know one another - Anyone can o it. Gossip draws its power from widely accepted traditional accepted norms Ostracism: - The removal of expulsion of people form a social group or the refusal to allow them to join that group - \*end of social sanctioning concept Agents of management and control: - Social control is practiced by all the major institutions in society, including: - Families: - When parents teach their children is acceptable - Schools: - Our textbooks - Workplaces: - Occupational and economic control over our lives. They can threaten peoples livelihood Formal control: Force and punishment - The state enjoys a monopoly on the legitimate use of force and violence in our society - The state also collects taxes and can use that money to put people in prison - Imprisonment, in Canada and elsewhere, generally fails to achieve the goals of social control Socialization: - The process of becoming a member of society, of becoming a social being, or the learning of social roles - Social isolation in childhood: - The savage of Aveyron- a young boy found in 1800 - DR. Jean-Marc Itard: the boys strangeness might be due to the effects of being raised in extreme isolation - During the first few months of a babies life, they must be exposed to people who will care for and love them, or else they lose part of their brains - The potential to become human has to be unlocked when babies are young