{"id":6231,"date":"2015-10-27T13:48:28","date_gmt":"2015-10-27T20:48:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=6231"},"modified":"2015-10-27T19:29:03","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T02:29:03","slug":"stereotype-me-society-does-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/stereotype-me-society-does-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Stereotype Me ! Society Does."},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"Stereotype-me\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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How do we live as individuals? How do we live in a society of different individuals and character?<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Introduction<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s often said that stereotypes are rooted in truth, but is this a valid statement? People who make this argument often want to justify their use of stereotypes. The problem with stereotypes is that they suggest that groups of people are inherently prone to certain behaviors. Arabs are naturally one way. Hispanics are naturally another; therefore\u00a0Stereotyping is a way of placing general characteristics on a certain group of people. Assumptions are made about how a group is supposed to look and behave. Stereotyping is often unhealthy because it keeps us from getting to know individual people, if we make assumptions about the group they belong to.\u00a0A good social theory reveals things that otherwise remain hidden; social theories are analytical frameworks or paradigms used to examine social phenomena.<\/span><\/p>\n

Social theory provides us with the basic foundations that can help us make sense of our lives and even explore the manner they connect to the processes which determine what we can do, how we can do them and the way we live. Social theory is a very complex study of everyday social life of individuals and societies in the rapidly changing and developing world that many people including students, teachers and researchers have spent their time trying to explain the complexities therein. Anthony Elliott researches through a wide range of theorists and the theories that they have developed on the subject[1]<\/a>. He eventually succeeds in showing how these theorists have revealed the complex social theory of day to day social life. Elliott has clearly written his work and has managed it in a manner that makes social theory relevant today. At some point in life, we are faced with challenges of tolerating people of other characters and behaviors. We tend to think they make mistakes and believe that we are the right ones. How do we evaluate our righteousness and wrongness? How do we conclude that other people are not doing the right thing? At other instances, we may ask ourselves why we are the way we are. Why was I born a Latino? Why was I born an African? Why was I born a Native? Anthony Elliott\u2019s theory puts it clear and answers the questions making it easy to understand. Besides understanding the questions alone fosters unity. The picture below is a typical example.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_5988_-_Gunjan_Marwah\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Summary<\/strong><\/p>\n

Elliott in the book \u201ccontemporary social theory: an introduction\u201d critically analyses the theories of social life in the modern day society where he lays focus on a number of issues or themes that he tackles explicitly. In the first portion of the discussion is the first theme where he focuses on the relation that exists between an individual and the society or between the action of human beings and the social structure[2]<\/a>. He says that this is one of the most vital issues in social theory and that most of the social theorists whose works he considered in the book resolve by either laying emphasis on the agency of the individuals or the power of the social structure or through combination of the concepts of the opposing sides that is the side one take takes depends on whether they value individuals first or the society. The second and a much closer theme of the book is the conflict experienced in modern societies. Much concern here is the hold of values that dominate the society, which according to some of the social theorists, are able to make societies united so that individuals are found to be in agreement with others. Societal unity is attained when people are drawn successfully into the larger social forces around them so that they can see the expectation of others from them. Another theme is that of social changes that take place almost in everyday life such as globalization, information technologies, techno industrialization of war[3]<\/a>. Contemporary social theory is charged to assess the rate of change taking place in the lives of individuals in the modern society and at the same time criticizes the forces by institutions that drive such changes. Another theme that the book focuses on is the issue of gender.\u00a0 The last theme concerns the relation between the social and the emotional between our public and private worlds. Many traditions of recent theories purport that the private life is greatly developed by the public but it is in turn restructured by the emotional responses and reactions of individuals.<\/p>\n

Reflection<\/strong><\/p>\n

Social life has always been defined as being freedom that one has and the things that constrain an individual or simply the possibilities present versus the disadvantages. A distinction between the contemporary society and the past societies thus emerges such freedom of choice, subjective reasoning and the limitations[4]<\/a>. The contributions of the various sociologists, philosophers, psychoanalysts and political theorists to contemporary social theory propose interdisciplinary studies on the self, society and history rather than limiting the reflection on society and the social to a particular discipline. Many social thinkers have made an attempt to answer the questions as to whether human reason can be able to make sense of the social world and shape it for the better; that the development of modern societies with vast inequalities in wealth among the citizens constitute progress; government intervention and regulations in particular issues also impact on natural social processes; among several other issues like alienation, loneliness, social disorganization, and secularization.<\/p>\n

The questions, we must all find answers to …“<\/i>How do we live as individuals? How do we live in a society of different individuals and character?”<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Bibliography<\/p>\n

Elliott, Anthony. 2008.\u00a0Contemporary social theory: an introduction<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>Elliott, Anthony. 2008.\u00a0Contemporary social theory: an introduction<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n

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[2]<\/a>Elliott, Anthony. 2008.\u00a0Contemporary social theory: an introduction<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n

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[3]<\/a>Elliott, Anthony. 2008.\u00a0Contemporary social theory: an introduction<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n

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[4]<\/a>Elliott, Anthony. 2008.\u00a0Contemporary social theory: an introduction<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n

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  How do we live as individuals? How do we live in a society of different individuals and character?   \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Introduction It\u2019s often said that stereotypes are rooted in truth, but is this a valid statement? People who make this argument often want to justify their use of stereotypes. The problem with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[238],"class_list":["post-6231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-elliott","cohort-lgp6"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6231"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6231\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6235,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6231\/revisions\/6235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}