symbolic interactionism and inequality

However, when groups are involved in strategic action then these calculations, in as much as they can be made, become quite important. Michael Schwalbe and five others present a theory of critical interactionism on how inequalities are created in society, and these can also be related to social mobility. Her idea for social mobility is to work herself at the telephone company and maintain kinship and neighborly social relations. Not all interaction is bargaining, and if someone in our personal lives is constantly keeping score and pursuing the maximum goods and services in our relationships, we most often regard this person as a taker who is too instrumentally interested in outcomes in a friendship relationship. However, theories of political sociology cannot assume unrelenting social mobility for everyone since most social mobility is relational. Medical doctors rising above homeopaths with the Flexner Report are a good example, but the process also applies to nurses seeking bachelors degrees to promote the status of RNs (Larson 1977; Abbott 1988). Generalized exchange is more community and group interested rather than self-interested. Social exchange is more generalized exchange as one might pursue in ones family or friend network. First, in chain exchange (item 7) one person gives to another who then gives to a third party, and this continues to include more and more people as in pay it forward. Second, there are individual to closed group and open group exchanges (items 8 and 9). These may be negotiated by a leader but the followers know the terms of the agreement and are quick to point out any violations. After a successful business and political career, he promoted his sons as politicians. For symbolic interactionists, race and ethnicity provide strong symbols as sources of identity. This involves two aspects of networking. 2000; Sandstrom et al. However, if a family member ignores his brothers and sisters, he will need to make up for bonding capital with an extensive focus on bridging capital to a higher social class. The first type is restricted exchange that is best characterized by market exchange whereby one gives money for some goods or services. In row 6 (items 16, 17 and 18) lower status persons with perhaps certain abilities and talents that they themselves recognize view their low status as being due to discrimination and bias coming from higher status persons. Afterwards, he says that no payment is necessary, but: Someday, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me. But again, the social mobility boundary is fought most between row 3 of the vulnerable high-status people, and row 6 of the discriminated against but talented low-status persons. In a sense, they are saying I want my social mobility back or I dont want others to be rising above me with their own social mobility. On the other hand, those on the bottom may make the claim that upward mobility has no effect on others at the top, but relationally, this is not the case. Oppressive othering penetrates the generalized other of Mead and indicates that people may promote or justify their positions in society by providing looking glass-self messages to others that they are inferior, inept, unworthy or otherwise inferior to themselves. [3] In the professions literature, a particular profession often engages in a professional project to raise the status of the group as a whole. He questions George Herbert Mead's predication of symbolic interaction as being based on "sociation," which is the general consensual pursuit of cooperate social relations. However, Strauss does not go far with this conception of bargaining as it might appear in political action. Eventually, they become upper-middle class by maintaining both their kinship and business ties by emphasizing positive family and business generalized others. However, a weak norm of generalized reciprocity (i.e., restricted exchange) will create weaker social bonds. Social networks of kin and association in social mobility settings can occur in different formats according to bonding and bridging capital. It is also discussed in a rather ethnomethodological form in Josh Pacewiczs Partisans and Partners (2016), though the gift relationship large resembles these other generalized exchange forms. One important type of restricted exchange involves an important time dimension (see 2 in Table 5.1). The end result is a more nuanced and extended theory of power in society with elements of motivation at the individual and group level. Group to group generalized exchange can occur also through mutually exclusive groups (item 10) or overlapping groups (item 11). One might say that this looks a bit like Robert Mertons theory of deviance (1938); however, the big difference is that Merton focused on blockages that exist but said little about the motivation and process by which they are accepted or overcome, and nothing about the emotions that they generate. Therefore structural sources of redefinition are ignored." (Term paper on Symbolic Interaction Theory, 2008). He questions George Herbert Meads predication of symbolic interaction as being based on sociation, which is the general consensual pursuit of cooperate social relations. This is when direct reciprocity is not expected except in a rather indirect way. The exchange is usually short (money paid for material objects, knowledge or personal services) and both parties are self-interested. Thus, social mobility is not just achieving skills by merit, but it is also about self-work or personhood about countering and converting elite processes of oppressive othering with generalized others. But it is the high ranking but protected people and the low-ranking discriminated people who are the most likely to engage in social mobility conflicts. For example, an individual receiving unemployment insurance promises to be ready and able to work, and to search for work and fail in order to receive the benefit. They are not as subordinated as those with degraded status, and they may achieve some limited mobility. A symbolic interactionist who does directly confront symbolic interactionism on questions of power is Lonnie Athens (1992, 1997). (2000) provide a more nuanced view of oppressive othering by viewing different attributions with external and internal reactions from generalized others. Following Goffman and bridging Mead and Athens, there seem to be two modes of behavior: (1) a general form of sociation where people generally intend to get along with each other as friends and associates, and (2) a strategic form of interaction that looks more like bargaining behavior where one has a sense of seeking specific monetary or other gains. We will refer to those who operate with more restricted exchange as opportunists in the next chapter on citizen selves. Her idea for social mobility is to work herself at the telephone company and maintain kinship and neighborly social relations. In row 2 (items 4, 5 and 6) high ranking people have largely inherited their rank by ascriptive principles and they rely on their traditional positions but may need to engage in defensive othering and internalization, In row 3 (items 7, 8 and 9), some people have high rank due to bias and discrimination and they are quite insecure and very much subject to downward mobility. 2000; Sandstrom et al. DuBois was one of the first sociologists to examine race and double consciousness (the feeling that one's identity is divided because of race) and how that influences the sense of self. When searching the word "socialization", the definition found was as follows: "a continuing process whereby an . The grandmother mentions the specific dress that the young girl wants at the most expensive boutique in town, and the scion she works for says, I know the owner of the store; I can talk to her. The grandmother then tells her granddaughter that the dress has been marked down by 70% of the original price so that it is the same price as the department store dress. Chapter 11 "Gender and Gender Inequality" examines some of the arguments of feminist theory at great length. Beverly Johnson combined bonding and bridging capital to maintain family solidarity and to advance her husbands career (since the husbands father died early, this limited greater bridging capital) both through the absence of the father and the tendency for widows sociality being restricted (i.e., there is no husband to promote and her lowered income makes the husbands mother a bit downwardly mobile). There is a bond but it is contingent on tit-for-tat exchange. Their chances of positive mobility are greater. They have deference and may have shame, but they seek to avoid these emotions by building negative subcultures where they are accepted with their deficiencies. 2014: 46-47; Reynolds 1987). Thus, the social mobility process is not just a reaction to blockages, but it is a creative process of external valuation through generalized others, and internal identification through self-processes. Although the favored Joe Jr. died in World War II, Joseph Kennedys sons John F., Robert and Ted Kennedy had peak political careers. Or if the exchange is to take place over a long period of time, perhaps for loans and bond purchases, the arrangement is firmly structured with a contract that covers many different aspects of the exchange. [1] This theory is elaborated by Samuel Bacharach and Edward Lawler (1980, 1981; Cook and Rice ) as power being the inverse of the number of valued alternatives that one may have in the sense of not being dependent on the relationship with the other. And the Kennedy example, which of course is well known, shows how promotion can even lead to the Presidency of the United States. Social exchange theory and symbolic interactionism are often thought of polar opposites, and in some ways they are. 2014: 46-47; Reynolds 1987). Ones and the others alternatives are measured by the number of alternatives times their value, which is the value of the alternative times its probability. Social exchange is more generalized exchange as one might pursue in ones family or friend network. In network terms, these processes are more reliant on strong ties than weak ties (Granovetter 1973). They actively construct a generalized other that recognizes their abilities and rejects oppressive othering, and they often will create positive sub-cultures among other low status but talented people that reflect their own more positive views (through ressentiment which was discussed earlier). The conflict theory garners most individuals into two classes that stimulate inequality. In row 2 (items 4, 5 and 6) high ranking people have largely inherited their rank by ascriptive principles and they rely on their traditional positions but may need to engage in defensive othering and internalization, In row 3 (items 7, 8 and 9), some people have high rank due to bias and discrimination and they are quite insecure and very much subject to downward mobility. Their motto, Wilson and Wilson, For the People dominates the airwaves on TV and the internet decrying the greed of insurance companies. And the Kennedy example, which of course is well known, shows how promotion can even lead to the Presidency of the United States. Gender Inequality, Functionalism and Symbolic Interactionism. Although Boston elites tended to discriminate against the Irish, some Irish social entrepreneurs become more powerful over time. Know the terms of the arguments of feminist theory at great length degraded status, and they achieve. 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