Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Chapter 9 Social Stratification In Conflict and Order: Understanding Society, 11 th edition This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law: any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network; preparation of any derivative work, including the extraction, in whole or in part, of any images; any rental, lease, or lending of the program.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Major Concepts Social Differentiation is the process of categorizing people by age, height, occupation, or some other personal attribute. Social Stratification is when people are ranked in a hierarchy that differentiates them as superior or inferior.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Major Concepts The hierarchies of stratification—class, race and gender—place groups, individuals, and families in the larger society. Life Chances refers to the chances throughout one’s life cycle to live and to experience the good things in life. Traditionally, the family has been viewed as the principal unit in the class system.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Class Social Class –Social classes are formed when a number of people occupy the same relative economic rank in the stratification system. –Privilege refers to the distribution of goods and services, situations and experiences that are highly valued and beneficial. –Class privileges are based on the systematic linkages between families and society.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Race and Ethnicity –Race is socially defined on the basis of a presumed common genetic heritage resulting in distinguishing physical characteristics. –Ethnicity refers to the condition of being culturally rather than physically distinctive. –The most important feature of racial stratification is the exclusion of people of color from equal access to society’s valued resources.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Gender –The sex-gender system is the stratification system that assigns women’s and men’s role unequally. –Sex roles refers to behaviors determined by an individual’s biological sex. –Patriarchy is the term for forms of social organization in which men are dominant over women.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 The Intersection of Class, Race and Gender The hierarchies of class, race and gender are interrelated systems of stratification. These systems of inequality forms what Patricia Hill Collins calls a matrix of domination in which each of us exists.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Theories of Stratification Order Theory –Order theorists argue that social inequality is universal and natural. –They argue that inequality serves as a basic function by motivating the most talented people to perform the most important tasks.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Theories of Stratification Conflict Theory –Conflict theorists argues that social inequality is basically unjust and the source of many social problems. –They argues that the oppressed often accept their deprivation as the result of false consciousness.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Deficiency Theories Biological Inferiority –The biological explanation of poverty is that the poor are innately inferior. –Some theorists have argued that certain categories of people are disadvantaged because they are less well endowed mentally (a theoretical version of social Darwinism).

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Deficiency Theories Cultural Inferiority –The culture of poverty thesis contends that the poor are qualitatively different in values and lifestyles from the successful and that these differences explain the persistence of poverty from generation to generation.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Deficiency Theories Critics of innate inferiority and culture-of- poverty explanations charge that, in blaming the victim, both theories ignore how social conditions trap individuals and groups in poverty. The source of the problem lies not in the victims but in the way society is organized to advantage some and disadvantage others.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Structural Theories Institutional Discrimination occurs when the customary ways of doing things, prevailing attitudes and expectations, and accepted structural arrangements work to the disadvantage of the poor. –The poor are trapped by this type of discrimination.

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007 Structural Theories The Political Economy of Society –The basic tenet of capitalism--the primacy of maximizing profit-- promotes poverty in several ways –Employers are constrained to pay their workers the least possible in wages and benefits. –By maintaining a surplus of laborers wages are depressed –Employers make investment decisions without regard for their employees

Copyright © Allyn and Bacon 2007