Finding Sociology

All of a sudden I found myself thinking sociologically when I noticed someone in a much different social class than me. I was driving home from the bank yesterday when I came across a man walking in the blistering cold with all of his possessions. The first thought that came to me was, "He must be homeless...". I realized that he was in the underclass. He didn't have a home, and he didn't have the money to buy himself new clothes, I know this because I have seen him before  in those same exact clothes. It was just difficult to see. And where I saw him, you would think he would be in a  little higher social class. I saw him just outside Wheaton Academy, a very prestigious and wealthy school. It just goes to show that just because you live near or a by a wealthy neighborhood doesn't always mean that your going to be a part of it.

When it Goes Off

This article is about a man named Robert who he and the narrator went to a riot. What the riot was about is unclear. They have no participation in this, they just wanted to spectate. Early in the passage Robert explains to the narrator that he is not allowed to be Tottenham for being a suspect for killing a man, who was in a previous riot. The police soon intervene to gain some sort of control on the crowd, some of the rioters attempt to rebel, the others remain on the pavement.

Structural Conductiveness: The crowd all stays together on the pavement for fear of getting arrested by the police

Social Strain: The crowd becomes impatient and begins to get violent, which makes everyone else in the crowd impatient and wanting violence.

Growth and spread of a Generalized Belief: the crowd believes if they are violent their needs will be met, creating everyone to feel the same way.

Precipitating Factor: The crowd would like more alcoholic beverages but the bar ran out of glasses

Mobilization of Participants for Actions: everyone suddenly wants more alcohol so they run out into the street causing more of a riot for their drinks.

Inadequate Social Control: The police needed back up to gain control of the crowd.

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Moment =)

All of a sudden I found myself thinking sociologically when I noticed all the social groups my little sister is in. She is apart of our family, she is a sister to me and my brother, she is in ballet, iceskating, girl scouts, and swimming. With a lot of these groups, they are secondary to her like ice skating and swimming, she talks to a lot of the girls in those classes but they do not hang out outside of it. But some people in her ballet class are primary, they hang out all the time and can be considered best friends. It is interesting to see how much she is apart of and to see her different roles. Her different roles can be a ballerina, a skater, a girl scout, a swimmer, and a sister. The last one is my favorite of what she is.

Vicious Circle

This article isnt that completly surprising to me. The different drug distribution, in my opinion is kind of stereotypical. How white men are doing heroine and cocaine and african americans do more smoking of marijuana. And how the minorities act, it is secondary deiviance, becuase they always seem to keep doing drugs, and knowing the consequences, keep doing it. The prison system for it all, seems like the right thing to do. By moving juveniles to an "adult" prison teaches them a bigger lesson. By them going to a bigger more scary prison it would teach them more of a lesson to hopefully make their next choice a sense of primary deviance.

New Moment

All of a sudden I found myself thinking sociologically when I was driving home with my mom and we saw a man walking on the sidewalk. But the thing is, he wasn't dressed in a normal attire. He was dressed in an orange jumpsuit which me and mom immediately think, he is an ex-con! In our minds he was dressed in a deviant way. And at the same time he was breaking a folkway. Most people do not just dress in an orange jumpsuit for their morning walk but he did. It isn't wrong for him to dress this way but he did and he didn't seem to care. He could be seen as a part of the Strain theory because he was norm less in he apparel and he was ok with it.

Response

I think that their child should be able to dress/act anyway that he wants to. If that means that he wants to wear pink and pretend he's a princess so be it. Nobody should be shunned for the things that they like and the way that they act. In psychology last year we watched a movie about kids who were born in the wrong bodies. They might have had a girl's body but they knew in their brain that they were more of a boy. It just made me think that no child should be forced to conform to how others think they should act. I think the parents in this situation did the right thing by not judging their son and making him do what they want him to do. I just dont see why it is okay for girls to act like boys but when a boy wants to act like a girl, the world comes crashing down and it becomes totally unacceptable. Some kids are like that and they should be treated exactly the same as anyone else regardless of what anyone else says or thinks.

Sociology Moment

All of a sudden I found myself thinking sociologically when, I noticed how the parental influence on my little sister has changed significantly. She is 6 years old and now she used to want my mom with her at all times, when she came home from school, at the house, with her friends...ect. Well, she is beginning to get influence from her peers. She no longer wants my mom to meet her by the front door because it is now uncool, and it is more grown up for her to do it herself. But I still notice their impact on her as they teach her how to mini golf correctly, how to write more neatly and how to tie her shoes. I also found myself influencing her, from me being significantly older, she talks and acts more like a teenager than her friends do. I catch her saying 'like' in every sentence and she just mimicks everything that I do, because she watched me as she grew up. I became and influence on her.





( Mrs. Haas, i wrote this all Sunday night but forgot to press publish, so it was saved as a draft...I swear I did it!!! then)

Well Hello Sociology

All of a sudden I found myself thinking sociologically when, I saw my mom break a social folkway. I come home from school one day in September, and I come to find her outside sun bathing. I start saying to her, "mom, you are the only person i know who will sunbathe in September" and she responded "Yes I am, and proud of it". This is an example of a folkway because she is not hurting anyone or effecting anyone but herself, and most people would just think that she was odd, just like I did. She was just breaking a social norm.

I also found myself in culture shock the other day. I went to my boyfriend's cousins Quincenera and me being Caucasian, I wasn't used to the customs that were going around. I didn't judge what was happening I was just in shock on what Hispanics do differently at one of their celebrations. Every 5 mins I would lean over to my boyfriend and say Oh my goodness! I didn't know that you did that! That's awesome. I was just taking in their culture and learning new things. It was a good learning experience.

American Symbols

Apple, an easy recognizable symbol. Most Americans can see this symbol and relate it to Ipods, and computers. This symbol has become so obvious and noticable because of how technology is now popular. Apple, is the symbol for American advancements in technology.

Ronald Mcdonald is a symbol for the fast food chain, Mcdonalds. Which symbolizes American laziness, and the need for a quick meal. Mcdonalds has another symbol for obesity, because of how often we consume it. It is an oversweeping symbol of America.

Facebook is an American epidemic that is sweeping the nation. It has become the social scene of American internet that everyone seems to have one, no matter the age. Facebook is a American symbol because everyone knows what it is and what it can do.

 The American flag has many different symbols. One may be freedom, for this is the flag that we made when we recieved our independence from Britain. Others may be that the stripes represent the orignial 13 colonies, and the stars represent the 50 states. The flag is an American symbol that can bring us hope, and freedom.

 Baseball is symbolized as the American past time. It is known that baseball has come from America. America is known for baseball, and everyone watches it, most people play it once in their lives. Whenever someone sees baseball they associate it with America, because of how widely known it is.

Sociology...it's everywhere!!

All of a sudden, I found myself thinking sociologically when I was talking to some of my friends and we started using words that as an American culture, we have created. I found us talking about how we will facebook each other later, if we cannot find it on facebook we will google it instead. We were using words that were never meant to be verbs. But now they are due to the change in language in our culture. It is funny how a simple website can affect how we as a society speak to one another. When we speak to people who don't understand when we say things like "facebooking" or "I'll google it" we think of them as weird, or different. The mentality of how do you not understand this. It is just amazing on how one little creation can spark a new language in our culture. As we incorporate this new language into our culture it is easy to see how our values of things have changed. Now that these 2 websites are all we can think about for the most part we forget what it was like when they never existed, in my opinion our priorities are mixed up.

Bemused in America

I examined the article "The Ground Running Chicago Visitor Will Have Lots to Jog His Memory". Which was about how people in Chicago have began to jog, while in Europe it is not as popular.

Stefan finds jogging strange about the American culture because it is different than what he is used to. He also finds it strange that we dont care what look like while jogging, because in Europe they do not see the point of running just to nowhere in back when they can be doing something more productive like chasing a soccer ball and sweating. I think he finds this strange because this is not what he is acustomed to, this way of life is different from his. (this is a combintation of questions 2 and 3 =] )

I can relate the aspect of how he states, " American jogging is apparently not subject to covenience but to dogged dedication..." because i have seen in everyday life the same people running everyday, and these people are in shape. It is not the fact that they are trying to loose weight , it is for the mere fact of dedication; and dedication alone, well maybe some for the endurance but that is besides the point here. I also see a mojority of joggers taking their dogs out and multitasking what they do. It is a way for them to get more than one thing done, and provide entertainment, which as a society, we all apparently need 24/7.

Woah! Sociological Moment!

All of a sudden, I found myself thinking sociologically when I was in my statistics class. We also watched "What Would You Do?" and observed how different people react to different situations. And statistics is closely related to Emile Durkheim who is the first to use sociological methods. The classes, sociology and statistics. are closely related to eachother because they both include most of the same purposes. When I am in either class I fin myself thinking, "wow, i heard something just like this in my other class".

In both classes I have to observe people around me and record what I see. I have to do this in both classes to record accurate data. I find it funny that my classes are so closely related, but not surprised. In typing this I have realized that I have taken classes related to eachother in order to achieve my career. Woah freaky! Sociology, you are just everwhere!

Let Me Tell You About Myself =)

Me? I'm a fun loving girl who is obsessed with the color orange. The only thing that can top the color orange is the movie, Finding Nemo. I am in love with this movie because it has adorable concepts and characters and a good story line/ plot.  In my opinion, best children's movie ever made. =D

What makes me..me is my friends. With the level of friendship that we have we have come to learn that we don't care what people think about us, as long as we have a good time together, nothing else matters. With that knowledge I can act random when I am by myself because I am comfortable with who i am as a person and what anyone else thinks of me is not my problem. I have never been afraid to speak my mind when it comes to something that I feel strongly about. It may come out mean or hurtful, but it's not my intention it's just me getting my own opinion across to make it heard. I have come to act this way by competing with an older brother to be the "dominant" child. So being loud and being heard mainly comes from that.

Trust is a huge issue in my life. It is another huge factor who makes me..me. After being lied to constantly from people I cared about, it became the one thing that now rules my life. If you can't be honest with me, don't talk to me because I don't have time for lies.

My goals in life mainly consist of going to college to study psychology. Where I want to go to do that is a mystery but it will happen. I want to become a successful psychologist. Eventually in my life I want to get married, but for now I am focusing on my future career. =)

My purpose in life? Well no one can really know that for sure, but I like to think that I am here to be there for people and give the best advice that I can to people and help them through their problems. That is mainly why I want to study psychology. =)

Motto in life: Just keep swimmimg =)