CRM 2301 Lecture 8: Lect. 8 - Anomie and Strain Theory
24 Oct 2015
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Document Summary
Merton"s theory: the culture defines certain goals as worth striving for and what we need to achieve, wealth is equated with personal values, social status, and prestige. Institutionalized means: hard work, deferred gratification, honesty, and education: means must provide some intrinsic satisfaction for all persons who participate in culture. It"s not whether you win, it"s how you play the game. Satisfaction comes from the following means rather than the goals. However, in american culture the goal has been emphasized to a point that the institutionalized means have little reward in themselves: compare a hard working individual and one who defrauds. The lower class does not have as many means or even access to them as the. Merton"s mode of individual adaptation middle class: various ways an individual responds to anomie: depending on his/her attitude towards cultural goals and the institutionalized means, conformity: accept both goals and institutionalized means.
