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Society

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Society Gerhard Lenski: Society and Technology Karl Marx: Society and Conflict Max Weber: The rationalization of Society Emil Durkheim: Society and Function – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Society


1
Society
  • Gerhard Lenski Society and Technology
  • Karl Marx Society and Conflict
  • Max Weber The rationalization of Society
  • Emil Durkheim Society and Function
  • Critical Evaluation

2
Gerhard Lenski Society and Technology
  • What are some of the differences between
    societies? How do societies change?, and What
    forces divide a society or hold it together.
  • Sociolcultural evolution- refers to the changes
    that occur as a society acquires new technology.

3
Hunting and Gathering Societies
  • From the emergence of our species 3 million years
    ago until just 12,000 years ago, all humans were
    hunters and gatherers.
  • Hunting and Gathering- the use of simple tools to
    hunt animals and gather vegetation.

4
Horticulture and Pastoral Societies
  • 1200 years ago people discovered horticulture.
  • Horticultural- the use of hand tools to raise
    crops. People used a hoe to work the soil and a
    digging stick to punch holes in the ground to
    plant seeds. This was a huge break through, it
    allowed people to grow their own food instead of
    hunting and gathering it.

5
  • Humans first planted gardens in the Middle East
    and then in Latin America and Asia. Within 5000
    years horticulture spread throughout most of the
    world.

6
  • Pastorialism- refers to the domestication of
    animals.
  • Tribes who became pastoral remained nomadic
    compared to horticulture communities who were
    more likely to remain in one place for a while.

7
Agarian Societies
  • About 5000 years ago agriculture was discovered
    by the Middle East and then spread to most of the
    world.
  • Agriculture- large scale cultivation using plows
    harnessed to animals or more powerful energy
    source.
  • Plowing allowed people to cultivate large amounts
    of land and aerating the soil increased fertility.

8
  • Among hunting and gathering and also horticulture
    societies women were the primary role of
    providers of food. Agriculture however propels
    men into a social dominant role.
  • Agrarian societies have the greatest
    specialization and the most social inequality.
    This technology gives people a greater range of
    life choices, which is why agrarian societies
    differ more from one another than horticulture
    and pastoral societies.

9
Industrial Societies
  • Industrialism- is the production of goods using
    advanced sources of energy to drive large
    machinery.
  • People went to the cities to work, leaving behind
    close kinship ties. Rapid change and movement
    from place to place generated anonymity, cultural
    diversity, and numerous subcultures and
    countercultures.

10
Postindustrial Societies
  • Postindustrialism- refers to technology that
    supports an information-based economy.
  • The Limits of Technology
  • Technology remedies many human problems, it
    raises production, reduces infectious diseases.
    It however does not eliminate hunger and is not a
    quick fix for social problems.

11
Karl Marx Society and Conflict
12
  • Marx struggled with the basic contradiction of so
    many people being so rich and so many people
    being so poor.
  • Social Conflict- struggle between segments of
    society over valued resources.

13
Society and Production
  • Marx observed the early stage of industrial
    capitalism in Europe.
  • Capitalists- people who own and operate factories
    and other businesses in pursuit of profit.
  • Proletarians- people who sell their productivity
    labor for wages.
  • Conflict between capitalists and workers is
    inevitable in a system of capitalist production.

14
  • Social Institutions- the major sphere of social
    life, or societal subsystems, organized to meet
    human needs.

15
  • Marxs argued that one institution- the
    economy-dominates all the others and defines the
    character of a society.
  • False Consciousness- explanations of social
    problems as the shortcomings of individuals
    rather than the flaws of society.
  • Capitalism and Class Conflict- Marx wrote the
    Manifesto of the Communist Party, where he
    described the two major social classes of
    Industrial Capitalism the ruling class and the
    oppressed class.

16
  • Class Conflict- conflict between entire classes
    over the distribution of a societys wealth and
    power.
  • Class Consciousness- workers recognition of
    themselves as a class unified in opposition to
    capitalist and, ultimately, to capitalism itself.

17
Capitalism and AlienationMarx
  • Alienation- the experience of isolation and
    misery resulting from powerlessness.
  • 1. Alienation from the act of working.
  • 2. Alienation from the products of work.
  • 3. Alienation from other workers.
  • 4. Alienation from human potential.

18
Revolution
  • The only way out of the trap of capitalism,
    argued Marx, is to remake society.

19
Max Weber The Rationalization of Society
20
  • Tradition- sediments and beliefs passed from
    generation to generation.
  • Rationality- deliberate, matter-of-fact
    calculation of the most efficient means to
    accomplish a particular task.

21
Is Capitalism Rational?
  • Weber and Marx are on opposite side of the
    argument.
  • Weber considered industrial capitalism the
    essence of rationality because capitalists pursue
    profit in whatever ways they can.
  • Marx believed capitalism was irrational because
    it failed to meet the basic needs of most people
    on earth.

22
Webers Great Thesis Protestantism and
Capitalism Calvinism
  • Rational Social Organization

23
  • 1. Distinctive social institutions.
  • 2. Large-scale organizations.
  • 3. Specialized tasks.
  • 4. Personal discipline.
  • 5. Awareness of time.
  • 6. Technical competence.
  • 7. Impersonality.

24
Rationality and Beaucreacy-
  • The Medieval church grew large, but it remained
    basically traditional and resisted change,
    according to Weber.

25
Rationality and Alienation
  • Max Weber like Karl Marx recognized the
    efficiency of capitalism. Weber also agreed that
    modern society generates widespread alienation.

26
Emile Durkheim Society and Function
27
Structure Society Beyond Ourselves
  • Durkheim recognized that society exists beyond
    ourselves. Society is more than the individuals
    who compose it society has a life of its own
    that stretches beyond our personal experiences.

28
Social facts-
  • Patterns of behaviorcultural norms, values and
    beliefsexist as established structures and are
    social facts that have an objective reality
    beyond the lives of individuals.

29
Function Society as System-
  • The significance of any social fact, he
    explained, is more than what individuals see in
    our immediate lives social facts help society as
    a whole to operate.

30
Personality Society in Ourselves
  • Society is beyond ourselves and also in
    ourselves. Each of us builds a personality by
    internalizing social facts. How we act, think,
    and feelour essential humanityis drawn from the
    society that nurtures us.

31
Modernity and Anomie
  • Anomie- a condition in which society provides
    little moral guidance to individuals.

32
  • Mechanical Solidarity- social bonds based on
    common sentiments and shared moral value that are
    strong among members of preindustrial societies.
  • With industrialization Durkheim believed that
    mechanical solidarity becomes weaker, and people
    cease to be bound by tradition.

33
  • Organic Solidarity- social bonds based on
    specialized and interdependence that are strong
    among members of industrial societies.
    Solidarity is based on differences among people.
  • Division of Labor- a specialization of economic
    activity.

34
Durkheims Delimma
  • The technological power and greater personal
    freedom of modern society come at the cost of
    declining morality and the rising risk of anomie.

35
Critical Evaluation
  • What holds Societies together?
  • How have Societies changed?
  • Why do Societies change?
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